Starting From Scratch: Part II
by JadeSullivan
Summary: Sequel to Starting From Scratch. Harry returns to Hogwarts for his fourth year, where dangers threaten to destroy the peace he and Sirius found over the summer.
1. Prologue

**Summary****: Sequel to Starting From Scratch. Harry returns to Hogwarts for his fourth year, where dangers threaten to destroy the peace he and Sirius found over the summer. **

**Beta: ObsidianEmbrace**

**Story Notes: As this is the second part in a series, be sure to read the original, _Starting From Scratch_, before you begin this one! Hope you enjoy :-)**

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**Starting From Scratch: Part II**

**Prologue: August 1994**

"Here, take these pajamas. Make sure you fold them..."

"What did you think I was gonna do? Roll them up in a ball?"

"I guessed wrong, then?"

Harry shrugged, slipping his bundle of pajamas underneath his armpit. He hid a smile. "Probably not."

"Didn't think so."

Harry rolled his eyes.

Sirius grinned to himself as he bent back over the laundry basket sitting in the middle of the kitchen floor. "Erm," he drawled in thought, "wait a moment--take these socks as well."

"I've got twenty pairs packed already, Sirius." Harry nearly dropped his pajamas as he lunged to catch the flying socks.

"Well…" Sirius commented, turning back to the mountain of fresh laundry, "now you've got twenty-one."

Pulling out a chair from the small kitchen table, Harry sat down, laid his clothing in his lap, and watched as Sirius rifled through the pile.

"Ron's going to Diagon Alley on Monday with his mum," Harry told his godfather. "Can we go then instead of tomorrow?" The crowded stores in Diagon Alley on Saturdays tended to give Harry a bit of a headache. He wasn't much of a shopper.

Without turning around, Sirius passed back a wad of clean underwear. "You already asked me about that, nutter…"

Harry quickly grabbed the handful of white pants and folded them, along with his socks, into his flannel pajamas. "I only _told_ you about it this morning," Harry reminded him. "I didn't ask you then if we could go."

"Yes, you did."

"I didn't, Sirius…"

Swiping a wavy shock of hair out of his eyes, Sirius twisted around in his squatting position and gave Harry a peculiar look. "You did _so_," he insisted, reaching into the basket and flinging a random t-shirt at Harry's nose.

Harry's eyelids fluttered as the shirt flew into his face. "I did?"

Sirius lowered his chin, pulling an exaggerated face of incredulity. "You _did_." He cocked the corner of his mouth, as if preparing for a laugh. "It hasn't been that long since morning, Bub…don't you remember?"

Harry shrugged. "All I said was that it sounded like fun…"

"Ah," Sirius teased, really grinning now, "quite different than _asking_ if we could go, is it?"

"Yeah…"

Emitting a silent chuckle, Sirius winked at him. "Slide down off your bum and help me. I'm almost finished."

"Can I pack these first?" Harry held up his rumpled clothing.

"If you fold them…"

"I will." Harry stood, doubling over his pajamas and t-shirt as he walked over to his open school trunk in the living room. Kneeling down, he stuffed them in an empty corner. A few more things to pack and his trunk would be full to the brim. He smiled to himself as he surveyed everything he'd organized.

It was loads easier to pack for school with someone helping; besides, this was the first year every piece of clothing in Harry's trunk was clean and unwrinkled. It felt nice.

"Did you save room for your books?" Sirius asked from the doorway; he stood with his shoulder against the jamb. "As much as you'd like to, we can't leave those behind, I'm afraid…"

Harry glanced over his shoulder, squinting at his godfather as if he'd gone round the twist.

Sirius shrugged; his mouth twisted a bit as his eyes danced with mirth. "All right, then. Be studious if you'd like."

Reaching into his trunk, Harry chucked a bundle of socks at Sirius' torso.

"Oy!" Sirius stooped, twisting his wrist to catch them. "These had better be clean."

"You just washed them…"

"Never said I was an expert." Sirius mimicked Harry's surprised expression with ridiculous exaggeration as he strode forward, trying to poke his godson in the armpit as he squatted down. He grinned when Harry immediately dodged; he was getting rather quick.

"You excited?" Sirius asked softly, his eyes still shining, even though his tone was less joking. "I always was."

Harry nodded. "This summer was fun, though."

"Yeah?"

"The best."

Sirius' grin deepened, exposing a small dimple near his jaw line. He tossed Harry's socks back into the trunk, reaching in to lift a pile of clothes. He frowned a bit. "You'll need more pajamas…"

"I've got a different pair for every day of the month, Sirius!"Harry sank back on his heels as he watched Sirius hoist himself up and walk into the kitchen. "Two months, probably…"

Another wad of socks flew into the sitting room, landing on Sirius' favorite reading chair.

Twenty-two.

TBC…

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**Author's Note: Couldn't resist writing these two again. I hope you stick around for the next chapter! Thanks for reading.**


	2. Chapter One

**Chapter 1: November 1, 1994**

Standing near his four-poster bed in the empty fourth year Gryffindor dormitory, Harry half-heartedly fiddled with the knot of his tie, not caring whether it ended up in the right shape.

The water in the shower wouldn't warm up this morning for some reason; Harry had stubbed his toe on the way to the toilet, and worst of all, Ron was still angry at him.

Ever since Dumbledore had announced the arrival of the students from Durmstrang and Beauxbatons Academy for the upcoming Tri-Wizard tournament that would take place at Hogwarts for the first time in years, Harry had been anxious and fidgety, along with everyone else in the school—except Hermione. Little could distract her from school work. Ron, however, had gone home with Harry through the Floo on Monday night to tell Sirius about the students that would arrive on Thursday…and to rifle through Harry's stash of chocolate frogs in the icebox. Ron had eaten five of them…

Ignoring the scorching wave of hurt that rose in his stomach, Harry jerked his tie too tightly—the knot was as small as a knuckle now, pressing against his throat. As he reached under his bed to drag out his satchel, Harry heard muffled voices at the bottom of the stairs. He straightened slowly, frowning toward the open door.

Quick footsteps.

"…need to be rational about this."

"Rational? This whole ordeal is anything but rational. He's mykid—I won't stand for it."

Harry's mouth fell open as he watched Sirius climb the last few stairs with brisk movements, swiping his hair back with his palm as he stepped into the dormitory. Professor McGonagall followed right behind him, her hands clasped and her face drawn.

"This is yours, isn't it?" Sirius nodded toward the trunk closest to where Harry was standing.

"Yeah," Harry answered, puzzled at the solemn expression that washed out the crooked smile that usually adorned his godfather's face.

Wordlessly, Sirius strode forward and crouched down in front of it, unhooking the latches and opening the lid to rest on the foot of the bed.

Harry stood there, his robes unfastened and drooping off of one shoulder. "What are you doing, Sirius?" Harry's stomach rolled over as his gaze flicked from one tense face to the other. Had Ron told McGonagall that Harry had entered his name on purpose just to get him in trouble? That tosser.

He watched as Sirius pressed a stack of t-shirts onto a pile of clean underwear and peered down into Harry's trunk.

Oh, hell.

The panic bubbled. "I swear I didn't use an aging potion to get my name in!" Harry said, his voice croaking a bit. Harry wetted his lips. "Ron's lying, Sirius. He's sore at me—"

"All right, Bub, slow down," Sirius interrupted easily, pushing against the edge of Harry's trunk as he stood. He held out his hand. "Come and sit for a minute."

Harry stood skeptically still.

Sirius' brow softened as he forced a tiny smile. Taking Harry by the elbows, Sirius urged him over to the bed and sat him down.

"I didn't put my name in…"

Squatting down, Sirius worked his finger into the snug knot of Harry's tie and loosened it, reshaping it with a couple tugs and a wiggle. "I know you didn't."

Harry looked at him. "Then how come you're here?"

"My kid's name gets thrown into the Goblet of Fire somehow and you're wondering what brings me here?" Sirius raised an incredulous eyebrow.

"Dumbledore's letting me compete," Harry said, keeping his voice as steady as possible, even though his insides churned just thinking about it. "He said—"

"I know what he said. You realize it's Saturday, yeah?"

Harry frowned in confusion. Sirius gestured with his eyes toward Harry's tie.

So that's why Sirius was giving him a funny look.

Gazing down at his attire, feeling stupid, Harry scratched at the back of his head; he must have been more distracted than he thought.

"Sirius…"

At the sound of Professor McGonagall's voice, Harry and Sirius both glanced over; she was still twisting her fingers together.

"Could I have a moment with Harry, please?" Sirius' inquiry was neither pushy nor polite. But McGonagall pursed her lips into a raisin all the same.

"Very well." Her shoes clicked against the floor in smart raps as she strolled toward the staircase.

"Ron thinks I did it on purpose," Harry told his godfather when McGonagall's footsteps were out of hearing-range. "He thinks I'm showing off…"

"He doesn't mean that," Sirius consoled. "You're his best mate."

Harry swallowed and flicked his eyes away, hating himself for feeling so put-out.

Sirius cleared his throat softly. "Listen to me for a moment."

"I'm listening…"

"Well, look at me, rather." Sirius gave him a half-smile when he did. "I know you didn't put your name in the Cup—even your dad wouldn't have been able to cook up a potion to get past Dumbledore's age-line."

Harry just looked at him. "What are you searching for in my trunk, then?"

"Nothing but empty space." Sirius' face went somber again. "I was making room for you to pack the rest of your things."

"Why?" Harry frowned again. "Do you need me home for the weekend?"

"Well…for starters…"

Harry shifted on his unmade bed, tucking a foot under his backside. "What do you mean?"

"Dumbledore is allowing you to compete with seventh years, Harry," Sirius said, "when he, himself, created the age-line…"

"I know."

"At the very least, it's unfair to put you in with seventeen year olds and expect you to match up to them."

"They're only three years older, Sirius."

"That's three years' worth of advanced Defense training…and facial hair."

"I'm almost shaving…"

"You haven't even a whisker on your face," Sirius countered with a wry purse of his lips.

"Yes, I have!"

"You could have a full beard down to your toes and that still wouldn't persuade me…"

"Persuade you to what?"

"To let you compete in the Tournament."

Harry opened his mouth and then closed it again; he squinted. "What?" Sirius started to repeat himself, but Harry shook his head. "No, I heard what you said," he cut in. "What do you mean, though? Dumbledore said I didn't have a choice…"

"It's a hazardous competition, designed for wizards who've already come of age. You certainly _do_ have a say," Sirius said with finality. "_I_ have a say."

Harry's pulse quickened, unsure of what he was feeling. "Did you talk to him?"

"Dumbledore?"

"Yeah…"

"For a few minutes, I did—right after I received his letter this morning." Sirius nodded and shifted in his squatted position. "Long enough to realize his mind was well-enough made up."

"So what did he say?"

"Exactly what I knew he would," Sirius said quietly, his voice taking on the same edge as it had when he'd first asked about Harry's trunk. "Which is why we're packing your things and getting you out of here."

"Out?" Harry raised his voice. "What do you mean?"

"If your own headmaster isn't going to take this seriously, then you've no business being here, at least not now, when someone obviously put—"

"I'm not actually _leaving_, am I?" Harry straightened up, unconsciously pushing away from Sirius. "I have class on Monday…"

"Don't worry about that," Sirius said smoothly. "I've got it handled."

"But I've got Quidditch!"

"Just pack your things for me, Bub." Sirius kept his voice even; he stood. "We can talk about this more when we get home, clear our heads a bit—come on, up you go; I'll help."

Harry pulled his hand away. "Everything's already in my trunk, except my books." His throat tightened in frustration. "Why do we have to talk later, Sirius?" "I want to talk about this _now_—"

Sirius let his hand fall to his side. "I promise we'll talk about it the second we're home."

"Why can't you just tell me what Dumbledore said?"

The short instant of silence that followed dimmed the atmosphere considerably.

"Because I've just asked you to get your things together, and you need to do it now, please."

"Everything's there in my trunk; I told you…" A tiny heartbeat pulsed against the lump in Harry's throat.

Sirius gave him a tired look, his gray eyes stern, but he moved toward Harry's trunk and snapped the lid shut.

"I'm not taking that…"

"Fine, I'll take it, then." Sirius heaved it up by the handle.

"It'll be the only thing going with you."

"Right," Sirius muttered. "Along with every stitch of clothing you own…"

"Good," Harry retorted, "I'll go starkers to class—I don't care."

Sirius turned. "You are being _ridiculous_."

"I'm being ridiculous!"

"Yes," Sirius shot back, "you are. I said I we would talk when we get home, and we will. Now enough with this tantrum you've decided to throw—"

"I don't throw tantrums, Sirius."

"Of course you don't," Sirius said with an exasperated tilt of his head, "you always talk to me in whinging shouts…"

"But it's all bound by magical contract!" Harry cried. "Dumbledore said I had to—"

"I don't care if Dumbledore said he would partner you in the competition," Sirius argued, hoisting up Harry's trunk to get a tighter grip. "You're not participating."

"Well, all right, then I _don't_ have to!" Harry stood his ground a bit longer. "You have rights over Dumbledore, you know." Sirius pulled another exhausted face, but Harry continued anyway. "Just tell him I'm not allowed—I can still stay here at school and watch the other schools compete. I'll Owl you every day…"

"If I don't find you queued up behind me in the next three seconds…" Sirius trailed off, both eyebrows raised.

Harry gripped his bedpost. "Just hear me out, Sirius."

"I've been hearing you out for the past five minutes…"

A telling pause.

Harry's defiance began to wilt. He gazed at Sirius through an expression that was more than pathetic. "I don't want to leave Hogwarts. Everyone will think I'm a complete prat—they'll think I'm frightened."

Sirius studied him, exhaled through his nose, and set down Harry's trunk almost silently. He made a gesture with his head that Harry recognized immediately.

Releasing the bedpost, Harry dragged his feet.

"Listen," Sirius said gently, holding Harry by the shoulders, "I know you don't fancy leaving school, but you've got to understand my reasons for it…you've got to trust me—no, don't pull away, just listen for a second."

Harry fixed his eyes on Sirius' rolled-up sleeve cuff.

"I'm not trying to embarrass you or ruin your year, Harry," his godfather continued, his fingers contracting against Harry's shoulders. "I'm worried—and not just about the danger you'd be putting yourself in by competing."

Harry dragged his gaze over, chewing on his lower lip.

"You've sent me three letters since September about the dreams you're still having," Sirius said, dipping his chin to meet Harry's eyes. "And we can't pretend that there isn't anything odd going on."

It was much easier to pretend. But still, Harry said nothing.

"I don't know what it is, but I don't feel safe with you here…"

Harry scrunched up his forehead—now that was too much. "Professor Moody's an Auror, Sirius—he's a dark wizard-catcher…"

"I know."

"Well, he's been here for two months, and nothing's happened…besides, he teaches us loads about Defense."

"Yes, you told me," Sirius said with a nod. "I think that's wonderful—"

"And I'm sure Dumbledore's got him on the look-out, especially with the Tournament and everything…"

"I wouldn't doubt it…"

"So, see?" Harry pressed on. "I'll be fine! I'll be very careful; I won't even go to Hagrid's—"

"Harry James…" Sirius lowered his hands, but kept Harry pinned with his deep gray eyes.

"I'll Floo-call every night!"

"You won't—unless you'd like to call from the parlor while I'm reading in the sitting room." Sirius stooped to gather Harry's trunk once again. "Come on, then. We need to speak to Professor McGonagall before we go."

The heat swelled in Harry's chest again. So much for looking pathetic…

"I'm not going, Sirius."

The handle of Harry's trunk hung against Sirius' fingertips as he eyed Harry almost disbelievingly. And then his face became very still. "Pick up your satchel and follow me down the stairs."

Harry's gaze dropped a bit in the stifling silence.

"I'm not asking anymore," Sirius said quietly.

Harry stood cemented to the floor, feeling as though he had swallowed lead. He hadn't meant for things to get like this. But every single bit of this was so unfair… Sirius had to know it.

"I won't go," Harry croaked. He heard the soft thud of his trunk meeting the floor.

"What did I just say?"

Harry clenched his fists, but didn't answer; he didn't have to.

"Do I really have to put you across my knee…in the middle of your _dormitory_?"

The backs of Harry's eyes burned; his face was so hot it hurt. Sirius was well-past fed-up.

"You are _fourteen_ yearsold."

More silence. Buzzing silence.

"No." Harry's voice cracked.

"No?"

Harry licked his lips; he hated himself right now. "You don't have to."

"I don't?"

Harry's whole gut cringed at that tone. The firmness he could deal with; the disappointment killed him.

He gave a rusty shake of his head.

"Pick up your satchel," Sirius repeated.

Harry did.

Lifting Harry's trunk, Sirius brushed the back of his hand over his forehead to clear away a strand of hair and wheeled it toward the door. Neither of them looked at each other.

Harry followed.

-----

One simple nudge with Harry's toes, and his satchel fell off of his bed and onto the floor with a _splat_. He tucked his foot back under his leg and adjusted the pillow under his cheek to find a cool spot. Harry swiped at his stuffy nose with the back of his wrist one more time as he lay sprawled on his stomach in the middle of his bed. His real bed.

It had been a couple of hours since he and Sirius had left Hogwarts, after having the worst argument Harry could remember. He had been so embarrassed and angry the whole time Sirius was speaking to Professor McGonagall in the common room that his ears had rung. Harry had stuffed the piece of parchment covered with a month's worth of Transfiguration assignments deep into his pocket so that it crumbled.

Harry hadn't said goodbye to his Head of House on purpose. His godfather wasn't serious about pulling him out of Hogwarts for good—he couldn't be. All Sirius needed was a weekend to cool off and think things through.

Obeying Sirius wasn't an option, apparently, but Harry didn't have to speak to him if he didn't want to. And for the first half hour, he hadn't. Harry had gone straight to his room without being sent. He even did a fine job of ignoring his growling stomach—until Sirius had knocked softly on his door, quietly setting a whole plateful of warm crumpets and jam with a glass of milk at Harry's desk.

Harry had felt Sirius standing in the doorway for a minute, but he wouldn't glance back at his godfather, or acknowledge his breakfast…even though it smelled great. The noisy silence continued to reign.

Only when Harry heard the door close gently behind him did his nose start running. Warm, silent tears seeped into his pillowcase until Harry became frustrated with the whole business, impatiently wiping at his cheeks and nose until they both felt scratched and raw.

The crying didn't last long. But the empty feeling did. Mixed with the hunger pangs that were now gnawing at his stomach, Harry felt quite miserable.

Eventually, he dragged himself over to his desk and broke off a bit of crumpet, intending to only have a bite or two to ease the ache. But a few minutes later, Harry found himself stuffing a third one in his mouth and washing it down with large gulps of lukewarm milk. Sirius had already split each crumpet in half and slathered both sides with butter, the way Harry liked to eat them. And the strawberry jam only made them taste better, even though the insides were rather soggy now. Harry polished off one more, leaving two on the plate.

He lay down on his bed again, on his back this time. He stared at the bumps in the ceiling, wishing for all he was worth that his name wouldn't have come out of that stupid Goblet. He hated it when Sirius was cross with him and hated even more that he still felt angry at his godfather. Harry's forehead throbbed.

Digging into his pocket, he pulled out McGonagall's list of assignments, flattening out the parchment against his kneecap, and glanced it over. More Cross-Species Switching practice—where was he supposed to find a rabbit to change into a muffler?

Folding the parchment over his index fingers, Harry squinted at the brief note scrawled at the bottom in McGonagall's handwriting:

_**Potter—I know you are disappointed, but your godfather means well. You should not be made to participate in such a dangerous competition at only fourteen. However, please remember that Professor Dumbledore created the age-line himself and realizes this as well. He did what he thought was best, with you in mind, when he decided to let you compete. Nevertheless, we are all working to find a suitable solution. I do believe you will find yourself back at Hogwarts soon. Keep ahead on your studies—you should follow your assignment schedule and have your work completed each day. Similar schedules will be sent to you from the rest of your professors. **_

_**Regards,**_

_**M. McGonagall**_

Harry jumped at the tapping on his door. He crushed the paper in his fist and shoved it back in his pocket. Closing his eyes, Harry relaxed against his pillow as if asleep; he felt rather idiotic but could think of nothing else to do at the moment.

The bedroom door creaked as it opened.

A long pause.

"You awake?"

Harry's fingers tingled at the sound of Sirius' whisper, but he lay still.

The wood flooring groaned under soft footsteps. Harry felt his eyeballs fluttering behind his lids.

Another few seconds of silence.

And then Harry felt a tickle zing through his collar bones as something poked gently into the soft spot between his neck and shoulder. He smiled against his own will.

"Thought so…"

Harry's eyes slit open, but he turned over on his side before he could catch a glimpse of his godfather's face.

"I know you're angry with me." The mattress dipped as Sirius sat down.

Harry scooted his rear end over a bit to make room but didn't say anything.

"You love Hogwarts as much as I did when I was your age, and I took you away from it—from your friends," Sirius said.

Harry kept his back turned, but he was definitely listening. He had figured Sirius was going to scold him for being so stubborn earlier—but not this.

His godfather cleared his throat. "You expected me to be proud of you for braving the Tri-wizard Tournament, and instead I tore through the school, making an arse of myself. I didn't explain everything very well, did I?"

Lying still for only a second longer, Harry slowly rolled over onto his other side and looked up at his godfather, who somehow looked a bit ashamed of himself.

"I was just shocked, I guess," Harry finally spoke in a brittle voice.

"At seeing me in your dormitory?"

"Well, yeah, but…" Harry began, shrugging. He pressed his cheek against the pillow, feeling his face color a bit. "…you were really sore at me."

"I wasn't sore at _you_, Bub…"

"You haven't yelled at me like that forever."

Sirius didn't say anything for an instant. With his eyes fixed on the corner of his pillowcase, Harry felt his godfather shift. "Did I yell?"

Harry thought about that. "Not really, but you know what I mean…"

A quiet sound of acknowledgement.

"I didn't mean to embarrass you," Sirius said quietly. "I was just very angry with Dumbledore—the whole situation is frustrating."

"I just hate it when you say things like that…"

"Like what?"

Flicking his eyes over, Harry gave Sirius a half-hearted _look_.

"Ah, I see." Sirius gave a slight twist of his mouth that seemed to be stuck somewhere between amusement and ignominy. "You really think I'd tan your bum in the middle of Hogwarts?"

"Yes…"

Sirius sat rather still for a moment. "Mm," he mumbled to himself. Harry wasn't sure what to make of such a reaction.

Combing his hair out of his eyes, Sirius gazed down at Harry. "You haven't spoken to _me_ like that for quite a long time either, you know… Surprised me."

Hot, prickly shame warmed Harry's blood.

Sirius pressed his lips together.

"I'm sorry…" Harry murmured; the words stuck like rocks in his throat. He picked at a loose thread in his quilt until he felt Sirius' hand rest on his hip.

"Perhaps one day I'll learn how to explain things without causing the row of the century…" Sirius grinned at him—and then sobered, giving him a soft, knowing wink. "I'm sorry, as well."

Harry stared at him. An apology, even.

Warmth soaked up the last of the ache in Harry's stomach. "Will you tell me what Dumbledore said?"

"Have you had enough breakfast?"

"Mmhm." Harry nodded. "More than enough."

"Sit up a bit, then," Sirius said, giving Harry two quick pats on his hip. "I'll start from the beginning."

TBC…

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**Author's Note**: Hey, you _did_ find me :-) Thanks for the reviews!! It's very humbling to know that there are readers out there still interested. The story from here on out will diverge from canon. Hope you stick around! And here's to hoping I get buried under snow in the next couple of days so I can have a two-hour delay...Woohoo!


	3. Chapter Two

**Chapter Notes: The timeline diverges slightly from canon in this chapter (and the last one as well). There is a day that has been "overlapped" in GoF for reasons pertinent to JKR's plot. For this story, the champions were selected on Friday rather than Saturday, hence this chapter beginning on a Sunday :-) **

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**Chapter 2**

Swallowing a large mouthful of sugar-coated cornflakes, Harry tilted the cereal box to read the riddles printed toward the bottom as he sat eating his breakfast in the kitchen.

He could hear Sirius and Remus chatting in the sitting room, as quietly as they could without whispering, and it was becoming rather annoying. Harry knew that they were talking about him… and the Goblet of Fire. And anything else out of the ordinary that had happened in the past forty-eight hours…

Aside from Remus' early-morning visit (he usually visited in the afternoon and mostly in the summer), it felt like a normal Sunday at home—at least to Harry.

He had spent a weekend at home, toward the beginning of October. With Ron and Hermione nearby, as well as the rest of his friends, Harry was hardly homesick for Edinburgh. But it had been exciting to pack a small overnight bag anyway and take a step back from the noisiness in the common room, the occasional flying pillow in the dormitory, and Neville's burble-like snoring. It had also been nice to avoid Hermione's Saturday scolding-and-huffing routine, as Harry and Ron always waited until after eight o'clock on Sunday night to begin their piles of homework. At the earliest.

But the best part about coming home, besides the fact that his godfather had gone out of his way to stock up on Harry's favorite cereal, had been the grin on Sirius' face. Not even Mrs. Weasley had greeted him so warmly coming out of a Floo, covered in soot.

By this time on a Sunday, bowl after bowl of Frosted Fanged Frisbee Flakes would have usually settled into Harry's stomach.

But this morning, he was finding it difficult to choke down even one.

Harry's eyes scanned the riddles again, comprehending nothing as he swirled his spoon through the gummy clumps of soggy cereal and sugary milk.

Sirius cleared his throat from the other room and mumbled something about Dumbledore losing his memory... or maybe his marbles. Harry sighed and continued stirring. Annoying, indeed.

"…I don't think that's it, Sirius," Remus countered, as casually as always. "Albus is very careful about his decisions. Think of the care he took, making sure I received an education as a boy… and protection at the same time…"

Harry heard Sirius sniff and mutter something else.

"He would have put a stop to your sneaking out the moment he found out about it—you know that."

"We were fine, Remus," Sirius said quietly. "There were four of us. Harry would have no one if he competed… no training—"

"I'm not hard of hearing, you know," Harry broke in, letting his spoon clink against the bowl. He pushed away the half-empty cereal box and slouched back in his chair.

His godfather and Remus stopped speaking for a moment, and Harry was glad. He could almost imagine their expressions.

Someone padded into the kitchen, but Harry stayed where he was, flicking a stray piece of cereal along the table top, until all of the sudden, Harry felt a palm across his forehead, tipping his head back.

He blinked at his godfather's upside-down face.

"Oy," Sirius remarked.

"What?"

Sirius' eyes were hooded as he feigned a rather humorless expression. "Quite cheeky this morning, aren't we?"

Harry stared at him, unaffected. "I can hear everything you two are saying."

The corners of Sirius' mouth twitched as he continued to hold Harry's head back in an awkward, baby-bird position. "We were hoping that was the case…"

Rolling his eyes, Harry reached up to pluck Sirius' hand away from his fringe; taking the hint, his godfather obliged and sidled over to the sink.

"Finish your breakfast."

"I did." Harry sent the cornflake across the table and onto the floor with a sharp flick of his forefinger.

"I take it the box is ready for the rubbish bin, then?"

Harry shook his head. "There's still some left."

Frowning at him rather suspiciously, Sirius dumped two mugs of cold, half-drunk coffee down the drain. "How many bowls did you have?"

"Just one…"

A pause. Sirius ran the water to wash down the brown dredges. "You feel all right?"

"Yeah, of course."

Remus emerged from the sitting room, clearing his throat into his fist as he took a seat at the kitchen table.

"Do you want a bowl?" Harry offered the box of cereal to Remus, who smiled politely and shook his head. "Here, then, I'm finished." Holding the box over his shoulder, Harry waited for his godfather to take it from him.

He did. But not without the inevitable, "Broken both your legs, now, have you?"

Harry slumped down in his chair again. "I wish," he said under his breath. "At least I'd have an actual excuse for leaving…"

Remus raised both eyebrows, cocking them toward Sirius, for only a second, and back again.

His godfather propped his seat against the edge of the table, invading Harry's peripheral vision. "I wouldn't say that's a notion to mess about with…"

Harry tried to shrug, but his shoulders felt heavy, as though weighed down by an iron yoke. He and Sirius had talked about all this yesterday, about how Dumbledore was adamant on keeping Harry in the tournament to evade any unnecessary scorn from the Department of International Magical Cooperation (who had assured Dumbledore of the utmost care they had taken with the rules) and to keep Harry from discovering the consequences of breaking a binding magical contract.

Sirius had said it was all rubbish—that if Harry were bound by contract, he'd drop dead for refusing to compete; there was no chance that Dumbledore would put a student through that.

Even so, Harry didn't understand why his pride was suddenly feeling wounded once more—an utter relapse. A warm flush crawled across Harry's cheeks.

"I have to visit Hogsmeade this afternoon… for some stationary and quills," Remus piped up. "I thought you and Sirius might like to join me for lunch."

Still regretting his last words, Harry peeked over at him, all-too aware that Sirius hadn't spoken yet.

"I thought it sounded like fun." Sirius shifted against the table, the movement drawing Harry's attention. He pushed back a strand of hair that had fallen into his face as he gazed down at Harry, expectantly. "What do you think?"

Harry flicked his eyes toward Remus again before settling his gaze back on his godfather. "I don't need cheering up, you know—I'm all right."

Sirius gave him a funny look. "Who said anything about that? I rather fancy your sulking…"

"I'm not sulking, Sirius."

"Hm," Sirius commented, lifting his chin a bit, in a surveying manner. "Too bad…keeps you nice and quiet for a change." He winked as he pushed himself up, leaning over to sweep the cereal bowl off the table; he made his way back to the sink.

"Can I just stay here?" Harry pressed the back of his neck against the backrest. The sound of heavy ceramic against metal was louder than it should have been. Milk gurgled down the drain.

With his head bowed, all he could see of Remus were his fingertips tapping lightly against the tabletop—but they had stopped.

Sirius cleared his throat again.

Harry wanted to punch himself into unconsciousness. His mouth seemed to have a mind of its own, however. "I mean," he continued half-heartedly, "I've stayed here on my own before—you've let me."

From behind, Harry's spoon clinked hollowly as Sirius slid it into a coffee mug.

Remus' fingers were loosely clasped now.

Harry's chin slowly made its way down to his chest, his glasses slipping a bit; he left them be, caring little about how much of a berk he looked.

"Well…" Remus' voice floated over Harry's head as shoved his chair away from the table and stood. "…I should see to a thing or two before I leave for Hogsmeade—Floo me if you change your mind."

Sirius' must have nodded, because he didn't say anything to that.

"See you later, Harry."

Harry glanced up a bit and tried to smile. He listened to Remus' footsteps on the carpet, sighing in time with the familiar _whoosh_ of the Floo.

Sirius sat down quietly at the table. "It's all right to be put out—I know you're still disappointed."

Harry would have liked to agree or disagree, but strangely, he wasn't sure what he felt at the moment. And that embarrassed him more than anything; he didn't want to be a baby about the whole thing. Flicking his eyes back and forth from the cereal crumbs on the table to Sirius' face seemed like the best option.

"Are you thinking about Ron?"

Harry's stomach knotted. _Yes._

"Not really…" He pressed a crumb into a pile of dust. "It's not like I'm competing anymore."

"I don't think he realizes how dangerous it is," Sirius explained. "People used to die in the Tri-Wizard Tournament."

Harry found himself peeking up as he scrounged up the courage to ask what he'd been wondering. "But what'll happen if I don't participate? I mean, I know you said that Dumbledore wouldn't agree to the whole thing if one of us died—"

"He wouldn't think of it."

"Maybe, but, " Harry continued, wiggling as he straightened up a bit, "what if… what if I end up like Filch?"

Sirius cocked his head slightly, frowning. "Committed for life to a female cat?" His brows slanted in amusement.

Harry, however, wasn't finding any of this funny. He shook his head. "Filch is a squib—he can't use magic."

"Ah." Sirius lifted his chin in understanding. "Well, he was born that way… you can't suddenly lose your magical ability—no one can take that from you."

"They took it from Hagrid…"

"Just his wand."

Harry spared a glance into his godfather's soft eyes, wishing he could feel comforted and ignore the raging anxiety in his stomach.

Seeming to sense this, Sirius leaned over and brushed Harry's fringe out of his eyes. "It'll work itself out."

Harry nudged up his glasses, giving a tiny shake of his head. "I doubt it."

Sirius propped his head up with his elbow, his knuckles resting against his mouth; Harry could feel his godfather's gaze on him. "Let's go get dressed so we can have lunch with Remus," he said after a moment.

Trying not to pull a face, Harry felt his shoulders slump. "I don't want to, Sirius…" By now, the story of Harry's removal from Hogwarts would have somehow traveled around the entire school, and the prospect of being seen by _anyone_ was enough to make him roll into a ball and never uncoil.

"Oh, come on," Sirius said, an air of enticement in his voice as he latched onto Harry's shoulder and gentle jostled him from side to side. "Remus and I have a dull time without you." Sirius ducked his head, trying to catch Harry's eye. "No need to punish yourself." He exaggerated a rather melancholy frown. "Or me…"

"The only person I wouldn't mind seeing right now is Hermione."

"Well," Sirius said, abandoning his jocular light shoving, "it's not a Hogsmeade weekend for students, so you won't… unless she's gone with her mum and dad?"

Harry shook his head. "No, she does homework on Sundays." The unwelcome image drifted to the surface of Harry's memory—sitting at a table with Ron across from Hermione's in the Gryffindor common room; while she studied, they would play wizard's chess as quietly as they could while making ridiculous faces to keep from swearing out loud when one of their pawns was crushed to bits, Hermione's exasperated sighs gradually increasing in volume—

"You can have seconds on butterbeer..." Sirius' suggestion cut into the Harry's thoughts—thankfully, this time, though.

Harry gave a slight twist of his mouth.

"Chips with salt and vinegar?"

Wrinkling his nose now, Harry scratched at his sleep-tousled fringe. "Ketchup, maybe."

"_Oy_," Sirius exclaimed. "There's hope for us after all—go get dressed." He grasped Harry's hand to pull him up.

Reluctantly, Harry let himself be hoisted. "I'm just not in the mood to go…" He steadied himself with the flat of his hand against the table. "I'll catch up on sleep."

Sirius raised an eyebrow. "You'll certainly catch something if you don't go put some clothes on." He turned Harry toward the stairs with both hands on his shoulders, walking him through the kitchen. A quick swat to the rear end sent him towards the railing.

Harry frowned as he sluggishly took the stairs, the cuffs of his baggy pajama bottoms hanging over his toes; Harry ignored them.

"That's it," Sirius called from the bottom of the steps, his tone tilted with mirth, "cheerful, now."

"Why can't you make up your mind? Either you want me away from Hogwarts or you don't…" The words tumbled out before Harry could stop them. His ribs felt like they were shrinking as he slowly climbed the last few stairs. He waited for Sirius to say something back, but there was silence.

Harry dragged his feet to his bedroom, his face turning hot as he pictured Sirius still staring up at him from the landing.

TBC…

* * *

**Author's Note:** **As always, thank you very much for your interest in the story and for the reviews! I tried my best to respond to as many as I could; I read and appreciated each one :-) Am going for the quicker updates; hope you enjoyed!! **

****ObsidianEmbrace, brilliant beta and friend, has begun a Yahoo group for the ultimate Sirius (and Gary Oldman) fan. I've joined and so have several others who have an intense love for all things Sirius. If you're interested in joining, we post updates for our Sirius-centric stories, as well as artwork, photos, and our favorite quotes--check out the link on my profile page.**


	4. Chapter Three

**Chapter 3**

"Absolutely not."

"Hermione!"

"Why _not_?"

"Come on!"

The three boys voiced their complaints simultaneously, causing Hermione to raise her eyebrows in surprise before glaring at the redheaded brothers in annoyance.

"Isn't it obvious?" she retorted, glancing around the empty Gryffindor common room, lowering her voice before leaning back into the half-circle the four of them made sitting in front the fire. "If we're out of the castle without permission, we'll be in loads of trouble—"

Fred cut her off with a snort. "Hasn't happened yet, has it?"

"And to _Hogsmeade_," Hermione continued, ignoring Fred's declaration of confidence. "Anyone could see us…"

"I think you're forgetting who you're talking to, Hermione," George said amusedly.

"Unless she's only taking the piss about Moody…"

Hermione glowered at Fred. "I know exactly what I saw last night," she snapped. Ron shifted a bit next to her, and then settled his rear end back onto his heels. "But if you three are trying to make an adventure out of this instead of trying to help Harry—"

"Of course we want to help," Ron spoke up for the first time since Hermione had rallied them together halfway through breakfast, "but Fred's right—it'd be better to meet with him face-to-face, wouldn't it? I saw Sirius standing outside of the Great Hall yesterday morning; he looked like he wanted to rip someone's head off and if one of us uses the Floo to get to his cabin, I'll bet he goes mental…"

"Oh, don't be stupid, Ron." Hermione made a face, pushing a stray piece of curly hair out of her face. "This isn't about that—it's about breaking the rules; we're not allowed to use the Floo network without McGonagall's consent; she'd know if we did. Harry wouldn't want us risking anything to see him."

"Good to know you care…"

Hermione straightened up, her eyes narrowing. "Who's the one who made Harry feel awful about being selected for the Tournament! Only two days ago, you were giving him all sorts of grief—"

"Well, I didn't expect him to be gone, did I!"

"Shut up, the pair of you," Fred muttered tightly. "You'll ruin the plan before we've even got to Hogsmeade."

"There _is_ no plan!" Hermione hissed; she drew in a deep breath, her eyes darting to the sealed portrait of the Fat Lady. "Listen," she whispered, taking great effort to calm herself. "We have to think rationally about this—we can't just expect Harry to disobey Sirius and risk getting in trouble."

Ron shifted again. "But he won't be…not if Harry just asks him to go to Hogsmeade."

"For goodness' sake, Ron, it involves more than just that…"

"Look, Hermione," George intervened, "if we pull this off, all we're asking for is five minutes to talk to Harry…he can meet us at Honeydukes."

"Can you imagine what would happen if someone saw you three there?" Hermione asked, shrilly. "You'd be expelled—at the very least!"

"_Us_ three?" Fred echoed, giving Hermione a distinctive look. "You're the one who pulled us out of breakfast to tell us about Professor Moody yanking his hair out of the roots in the middle of the corridor, shouting Harry's name like a nutter—"

"—and you know Fred and I are the only ones who know how to get _you know where_ using _you know what_," George whispered. "Else you would've only told Ron—and Harry, if you could've managed it—"

"We know how you three carry on…"

Hermione blinked several times, her mouth hanging halfway open.

"You're right about one thing, anyhow—Harry couldn't have put his name in the Goblet with Dumbledore's age line keeping everyone out," Fred continued. "You saw what happened to us, with the beards and all."

George grinned at his brother.

"I—I never thought he did in the first place," Hermione explained; she flicked her eyes toward Ron, who met her gaze briefly, and then continued chewing on the corner of his lip. "It's just….I've never seen Professor Moody act like that before, not even when he shouted at Seamus for waving his wand as though he were casting an Imperius curse."

"Brilliant," Fred muttered, snorting again.

"No, honestly," Hermione raised her voice, her eyes shining with desperation, "it was a bit frightening—I'm only glad he didn't see me standing round the corner."

"Maybe he thinks Harry nicked his flask…" More snickering.

"Stop it, you two, I'm _serious_!"

Fred and George exchanged a glance and then sobered.

"Why don't you just send Harry a letter, telling him what you saw?" Ron wondered. "It wouldn't take more than a few hours for an owl get to his house, would it? They're already in Scotland…"

"I did," Hermione affirmed, tucking her bushy hair behind her ears for the third time since they'd gathered, "early this morning. I just don't know if it's got there yet…oh, I hope it has."

"So then what's all the fuss about getting Harry to meet us in Hogsmeade?" Ron inquired, squinting up at her.

"Oy!" George exclaimed. "Is he your best mate or not?"

"Don't be a prat, Ronnie," Fred added. "Even Hermione is willing to risk her spotless reputation to see him."

Hermione's eyes widened. "I did _not_ say that!"

Ron scowled at the brotherly moniker.

"I suppose I could just write to Sirius, to ask about Harry…"

"No!" All three boys gawked at Hermione as though she'd gone round the twist.

"Are you… _mental_?" Ron sputtered. "Harry'd never forgive you for that!"

"Oh, come off it," Hermione said crossly. "That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard."

"That's the most _embarrassing_ thing I've ever heard," Fred scoffed. "Might as well do him in."

"Well, if you three aren't going to help—"

"We're trying, Hermione," Ron insisted, "but you're sort of being impossible." He wasn't scoffing or smiling, and for once, Hermione didn't scowl. She stared hard at him, rather, as if she were trying to figure him out.

The twins shared a look.

Ron straightened a bit, clearing his throat with newfound confidence. "Right," he continued, gazing round the semi-circle. "We might as well wait for Harry, then, to see if he writes back."

"I haven't asked him to," Hermione said softly.

"But I thought you said—"

"Let me finish," Hermione interrupted Fred. She shook her hair back, regaining her unspoken authority. "A reply by owl would take hours, at least," she explained. "And if we're going to do this, it has to be today. It's too risky to be out of bounds during the week…"

"Now she's talking sense," George remarked with a slow grin.

"No one would suspect anything if Ron and I weren't in the castle today—we're always down at Hagrid's on Sundays…"

"We don't all have to go anyway," Ron interjected. "I'd be all right on my own—"

Fred snorted. "You'd be spotted in three seconds..."

"…about as long as it'll take mum to send a Howler—"

"For the second time…"

"And you know what happens on the second go-round," George teased.

"Ickle Ronnie gets his—Oy!" Fred narrowly dodged Ron's fist. "Manners, now."

Ron flashed his brothers an angry glare, his face deeply flushed.

Hermione rolled her eyes. "If that's what we must do, then of course I'd be going," she replied tightly. "I brought it up, didn't I?"

"That's the spirit," Fred commended her.

"But we have to wait and see if Harry could even make it," Hermione continued. "Sirius may not want to—Oh, _hurry_ up, Harry," she whispered, glancing nervously over her shoulder at the portrait hole and back toward the fireplace.

"Wait a minute," Ron said, the redness in his cheeks faded to pink splotches now as he squinted with Hermione into the low flames. "You didn't ask him to—"

"No, of course not," Hermione muttered, annoyed again. "Sirius isn't stupid—he'd know Harry was missing. We'll only see his face...just for a moment."

"And you don't think Sirius is going to notice Harry's arse sticking out of the fireplace…"

George made a sound of agreement at Fred's logic. But all four of them had their eyes glued to the hearth now.

"If he's not here in five minutes, we'll know he couldn't get away for a bit; I told him not to bother after that," Hermione said, more to herself than the boys. "I'll have think of something else."

* * *

The walls surrounding Harry seemed to sigh as water rushed through the plumbing from the upstairs bathroom.

Standing in the middle of the kitchen, fully dressed except for his bare feet, Harry gazed at the staircase. Aside from the sound of water draining through the pipes, the house was silent and still. It felt as though the walls had eyes—ogling him like a chess opponent, waiting for his next move.

Harry glanced at the small clock leaning against the back of the stove. Thirty seconds past 8:30. Still enough time.

Sparing the staircase a final fleeting glance, Harry crumbled Hermione's note into his pocket and walked into the sitting room. He grabbed a small handful of Floo powder and kneeled in front of the fireplace; the log was glowing a pinkish-red now, but Sirius wouldn't rekindle it, as the outside air had warmed enough to chase away the morning chill. Besides, they would be leaving before noon…

Harry swallowed hard, shifting on his kneecaps, as though searching for a soft spot. Surely, Sirius wouldn't mind if he used the Floo, just to talk.

_But you probably should ask first_, a little voice inside Harry's head nagged his conscience. He brushed it away. After all, what if Sirius wouldn't let him? Was he not supposed to contact Hogwarts at all? Even Ron and Hermione? After their small argument this morning, Harry didn't dare bring it up; Sirius hadn't even scolded him for his cheek.

The larger clock above the mantel read 8:31 a.m.

_Don't bother after 8:35, _Hermione had written_, people will start coming back into the common room a bit after—it's not worth it. _

Hermione: the last person Harry expected to ask him to sneak away for a minute.

Grits of Floo powder escaped from Harry's fist, trickling down his newest pair of blue jeans. He leaned forward and chucked his handful onto the logs. The whoosh of green flames blew his fringe back. Harry had used the Floo network many times, but this was a whole new experience—so much so that he unconsciously jerked his face back the first time it touched the cool flames.

Feeling rather stupid, but relieved that his face wasn't going to melt off, Harry glanced over his shoulder once more; finding an empty kitchen, he turned back toward the Floo and tried again.

* * *

The soft murmur of voices among the clinks of silverware dulled Harry's concentration, as he sat near the end of a wooden booth in The Three Broomsticks with Sirius and Remus, staring at nothing in particular.

Even the conversation taking place at his own table was sucked into the white noise swirling between the rafters of the popular Hogsmeade pub.

The inflection in his godfather's quiet voice eventually snapped him out of his reverie.

"Huh?" Harry blinked his eyes back into focus.

Sirius was staring at Harry's plate with a funny, furrowed expression. "You can eat those, you know…"

Harry dropped the thick-cut chip he had been squeezing, flicking his fingertips together to rid them of lukewarm potato guts before tucking his hand underneath the table and wiping it on his jeans.

A flicker of a smile. "Have you come back to us?" Sirius joked lightly.

As a habit, Harry rubbed his knuckles in an absent gesture over the knotty scar on his forehead.

"You've hardly touched your food," Sirius commented, nodding toward the pile of limp chips still crisscrossed into a now-greasy lump at the corner of his plate.

Shrugging, Harry scanned the few breadcrumbs surrounding the remainder of his meal. "I ate some fish."

"Half a piece…"

Harry nibbled at a hangnail on his thumb as he glanced away, pretending to take interest in the infant slapping his palms against the table and making odd squealing noises.

He tugged on the hem of his jacket for the twentieth time, just to be sure. Remus caught Harry's eye for a brief second and then turned his attention back to his chicken pie.

Harry swallowed and picked up a cold chip.

"Hang on," Sirius murmured, leaning up a bit as he retrieved his wand from its thin holster near his hip. A simple spell warmed Harry's food in an instant, the steam fogging his glasses.

Sirius winked and took a sip of his tea.

Harry gave him a half-hearted smile, not daring to mention he was anything but hungry. He forced down a few reheated chips anyway, gripping the bottom of his jacket all the while.

"Remus mentioned pudding," Sirius said after a long swallow. "You wouldn't be interested in that at all, would you…"

Shrugging, Harry broke a chip in half with his fingers. "Not really." He could almost feel the mirth melt off his godfather's face; Harry flicked his eyes up in the silence. Frowning stares. "I mean…I dunno," Harry fumbled over the words, very aware of what he'd just done to himself. "I should probably finish these first." A meager save. He bowed his head back over his chips, stealing a quick glance at them through his fringe.

Sirius was holding his teacup to his lips, eyeing Remus over the rim.

Remus, however, was still watching Harry chew.

Harry swallowed, barely tasting his food. "I need the loo," he mumbled. "There's one here, isn't there?"

"I believe so," Remus said with a nod, glancing over his shoulder as if to look.

"Mmm," Sirius mumbled his mouth full of tea. He pointed past Remus' head, swallowing noisily. "Behind that table…"

"All right." Harry slid out of the booth. Weaving around tables, over half of them empty, as the usual lunch hour was nearing a close, Harry let himself into the bathroom. It was empty as well.

After rinsing off his hands and drying them on the seat of his jeans, he stood in front of the small square mirror hanging over the sink. Smoothing his fringe down, Harry sighed as the black strands lifted right back off his forehead. But he couldn't care less about his hair. Unzipping his gray jacket a little, Harry reached in and clamped his folded invisibility cloak more securely under his armpit.

He stared at his reflection for a bit longer and sighed again; he zipped his jacket up to his neck, trying to ignore the twinge in his stomach. It was his cloak, after all.

Using it without Sirius knowing, though…that was different.

But what was he supposed to have done? Hermione had refused to talk about Professor Moody through the Floo—or anything for that matter.

A small part of him wondered if Sirius wouldn't just let him Floo back to Hogwarts for a few minutes to talk to his friends. But after what Harry had said to Sirius this morning, a larger part of him didn't want to even bring it up.

Besides, he supposed he could pass off his invisibility cloak to whomever he pleased.

It was only for ten minutes.

The lavatory door creaked open, causing Harry to jump a bit. An old man clad in robes as loose as the skin on his cheeks gave Harry a toothless putty-grin before shuffling back to the toilets. Harry slipped out of the half-open door and made his way back to the booth.

Sirius was gone, but Remus was still there, finishing off the last dredges of his coffee. He gave Harry a thin smile as he sat down, brushing back the dishwater fringe that had fallen into his eyes.

"Where's Sirius?"

"At the bar," Remus replied casually, placing his cup on the saucer, "ordering you a butterbeer…"

Harry nodded, gazing at the glossed-over nicks in the wood.

"Anything you want to tell me?"

Knocked out of his daze, Harry jerked his head up. The blood rushed to his cheeks. "No," he said quickly. "Why?"

"You're rather quiet…"

Harry shrugged and twisted around toward the bar, pretending to look for Sirius, who was standing rather nonchalantly, his fingertips tapping against the wooden top as he waited, as though the few wizards gaping at him made no difference. His godfather had been out in public several times since he'd been acquitted, but some people still gawked and gasped at him as if they were seeing a ghost…

Something clattered loudly against the ground. Harry turned back around.

The baby squealed, mirroring his mother as she leaned over to pick up the plastic set of rings that had skidded across the floor. But Remus had already eased out of their booth, collecting the toy for her. She gave him a grateful nod as he placed the yellow ring into the boy's tiny hand; he flashed Remus a gummy grin before putting the toy in his mouth.

Sliding back into the booth, Remus reached underneath their table for his napkin that had fallen off his lap.

Harry watched Remus' shoulder blades shift as he retrieved the napkin and waited for him to reemerge. And waited.

Slowly, Remus surfaced, a stiff, peculiar expression plastered on his pale face. His throat rippled with a swallow.

Harry sat very still, his skin tingling in the mysterious silence. He felt his forehead crumpling.

"Don't look up…" Sirius' voice startled Harry from behind; he carefully lowered a full mug of warm butterbeer right over Harry's head and down onto the table.

"Thanks," Harry said quietly, still pinning Remus with a questioning frown.

Sirius rounded the booth, handing Remus a fresh mug full of steaming coffee. "Oy," he remarked, snapping his fingers in sudden remembrance as he spun on his heel. "I almost forgot…"

Harry quickly leaned back to glance underneath the table as Sirius swept by him. His heart nearly skipped a beat at the sight.

Half of his left thigh was invisible.

Harry's face burned hot; he was too shocked to react.

"My thoughts exactly…" Remus' voice was soft but very stern. "I can't believe you would even attempt—"

"Don't tell Sirius," Harry pleaded, cutting him off, pulling a face of desperation as he caught sight of the wide, solemn eyes. "Please, Remus—don't." He whipped his head over his shoulder and back again. "It's not what you think…"

Remus leaned forward. "_Harry_ Potter," he breathed, half-surprised, half-admonishing. "What in Merlin's name are you doing with that?"

"Look, I haven't done anything with it," Harry whispered back. "I just had it folded in my jacket; I wasn't planning on using it…"

"That is _not_ true."

It wasn't in the least.

Harry licked his lips, searching for something to say.

"Hand that to me right now." Remus flicked his gaze past Harry's shoulder and then eyed him sternly once more, his brows vaulting impatiently. "Be quick about it."

"I can't, Remus," Harry croaked through a whisper. "Please, just don't say anything…"

"I won't," Remus said calmly—too calmly. He straightened up. "If you tell Sirius first."

Harry's lungs burned; he shook his head. "You don't understand; I didn't know what else to do…"

Remus sighed. "That's what your godfather is for, Harry."

"He'll be angry…"

_He'll be disappointed_, Harry's brain substituted for him.

"When has Sirius ever been cross with you?"

A small plate of butter biscuits settled itself in the middle of their table, causing both of them to look up.

Harry glanced over his shoulder. Sirius was smiling at Madame Rosmerta, the barmaid, as he passed her a handful of money. Pocketing the change, he strolled back over to their booth.

"I've never seen you refuse a biscuit yet," Sirius quipped with a gentle poke to Harry's side. "Shove over."

Scooting to the middle of the horseshoe-shaped booth, Harry's insides felt like lead. He spared Remus a glance.

"Well," Remus piped up, pushing himself up, "now _I_ think I need the loo…"

"I suppose I'm next, then," Sirius replied, giving Harry a crooked smile that he couldn't return, no matter how hard he tried. "Here…" He passed Harry his butterbeer. "And have a biscuit—these are your favorites."

Harry just sat there.

Sirius shifted slightly. "What is it, Bub?"

Harry watched as the lavatory door clicked closed behind Remus. Unzipping his jacket, he reached inside and pulled out his invisibility cloak. He handed it to Sirius, avoiding eye-contact.

Harry stared at the plate of butter biscuits for a long moment, waiting for his godfather to scold him. But after a while, Sirius simply folded up the cloak and placed it on the table. Harry peeked over at him through his fringe, an explanation brewing in his stomach.

Without a word, Sirius pushed himself up out of the booth and walked out of the pub.

TBC…


	5. Chapter Four

**Chapter Four**

Harry sat numbly in the booth, staring vaguely at his wadded invisibility cloak, which lay in an innocent heap on the table. He remained that way; hunched, a strange mix of shame and bewilderment swirling around in his stomach, until Remus made a slow entrance into his peripheral vision as he slid in beside Harry.

Soiled plates and cutlery floated up from a nearby table and drifted around the corner.

"…you hear me?"

Looking at Remus took effort. His sandy brows had disappeared behind his fringe, expectantly.

Harry shrugged. "I don't know."

"You don't know where he went?" Remus inquired, his brow coming back into view.

"He left," Harry said; the words barely squeezed through his throat. For once, he felt like setting his stupid cloak on fire.

"Harry, look at me." Remus' voice was heavy with concern.

Harry looked.

Another frown. "What happened?"

"Nothing happened…"

"What do you mean—"

"Nothing happened, Remus," Harry repeated, fisting the edge of his cloak. "He just left."

Almost immediately, Remus pushed himself out of the booth, his face drawn and inquisitive, searching the restaurant, as if Sirius might be lurking in a corner.

Harry pressed his teeth together, suddenly feeling more irritated than upset.

Remus lifted his chin and then glanced down at Harry. "Here," he beckoned, curling his fingers with a twitch; he nodded toward the exit once he'd caught Harry's attention. "He hasn't left."

Clenching the wrinkled material, Harry hesitated. He gaped at Remus.

"Did you have an argument?"

Harry felt his rear end slip down on the seat, involuntarily slumping in dread. He shook his head. "Not yet…"

"He's right outside," Remus said, tipping his chin toward the door once more. "I can see him through the window. Go and talk to him."

Harry shook his head again. "I just want to get out of here."

"Well, I'm afraid the only way we're leaving is through that door…"

A broom dragged itself back and forth across the shiny wooden floor, pushing crumbs around.

"Come along, Harry."

"I'm going… just give me a minute."

Stiffly, Remus lowered himself into the booth. He rested his elbows on the table and waited. A bald-headed waiter frowned at them as he swept past; they'd obviously overstayed their welcome.

"We got into a heap of trouble under that cloak once," Remus spoke up, his voice curiously unthreatening. Warm, even. "Your dad and me," he continued, "and Sirius…"

Harry looked up. "Yeah?"

Remus smiled. "Mmhm," he affirmed. "More than once."

Swallowing, Harry tried to keep his eyes off the door. "I know what you're trying to do, Remus, but this isn't the same thing."

"Isn't it?"

Harry sighed. He covered his thumb with the edge of his cloak, watching as half of it disappeared. After a moment, he shook his head.

"Want to tell me what you were planning?" Remus asked gently. But Harry didn't want to hear any more. This was all wrong. And he couldn't stand it.

"I'll go talk to him." Bundling up his cloak before Remus could say anything else, Harry wormed his way out of the booth and plodded toward the exit, feet weighing like cannonballs. Only Sirius' shoulder was visible through the filmy window, but Harry recognized it anyway.

He wasn't afraid—there was nothing scary about his godfather—but anxiety gnawed at Harry's gut all the same. He would rather face down Voldemort right now than have to look Sirius in the eye and explain the plan that, now, seemed dumber than ever. Keeping the invisibility cloak put away, save for emergencies, was the first-ever rule they'd made together last summer.

Harry hugged his arms around his middle, watching Sirius' shoulder shift against a wooden post. Tucking his cloak safely into his jacket, Harry pulled open the heavy tavern door and eased outside. He jammed his fists into his pockets as he stood behind Sirius.

His godfather must have sensed him, because an instant later, Sirius straightened and turned around. His own hands were shoved deep into the pockets of his trousers.

Sirius stared at him, squinting against the afternoon sun.

Harry's eyes found a tiny spider crawling over the toe of Sirius' shoe.

Neither of them spoke for a moment.

The sun warmed Harry's cheeks rather quickly. "I wasn't going to use it…"

"Yes you were."

Harry's glasses flashed as he peeked up into his godfather's still face. Sirius flicked his gaze away—just enough to make Harry's stomach feel as though it had been wrung out.

"Were you planning on giving me the slip after lunch?" Sirius was pinning him with a rare glare. "Or was it later?"

Harry met his godfather's stare now; he wasn't squinting anymore. "Neither."

"Oh, Harry James…" Sirius pulled a tired face. "I don't want to do this."

"Do _what_?" Harry shot back, his pulse quickening. "I gave you the cloak, Sirius."

His godfather studied him.

"And I said I was sorry…"

"No, you didn't."

"Well, I _am_," Harry insisted. "It was a mistake. I shouldn't have brought it."

Sirius lowered his voice very deliberately. He shook his head slowly. "Sorry just isn't going to cut it this time."

"I don't care if it does or not," Harry croaked, already feeling awful, but unable to stop himself. He forced his eyes away from that horrible glare. "I'm not going to be punished for something I didn't even do yet."

"Yet…"

Harry felt the tears climb up his throat, but he gritted them down. Who knew a single word could sting so much… Mostly because the accusation wasn't altogether false.

Sirius surveyed the space for spectators before leaning down a bit. "What were you planning to do with the cloak, Harry?"

Clamping his teeth together more firmly, Harry controlled his blinking. He shook his head the tiniest bit.

"No, none of that." Sirius reached forward, but a well-timed shrug kept Harry's chin from captivity. A wounded pause. Sirius folded his arms over his chest. "Ah, so we're back here again…"

"I already told you, Sirius—" Harry's voice was thick with the half-plea.

But his godfather only shook his head. "You can be cross with me all you like, Harry, but it still doesn't change the fact that you intended to break one of our rules, does it?"

Burying his face in his hands would be rather juvenile at the moment, even though Harry desired nothing else, but he forced his fists to remain in his jacket pockets. "Yes," he said weakly. "It does."

"All right," Sirius muttered, letting his arms drop. "I've heard enough. We're going home."

"I didn't want to go in the first place…"

"Harry." Sirius caught him by the upper arms before he could pull away. He looked hurt. "Stop it."

The door of the tavern opened. Remus stood there, his worn-out shoe acting as a doorstop; he looked rather uncomfortable.

Sirius let go of Harry's arms.

"Oh…" Remus glanced over his shoulder. "Sorry," he added to the man trying to squirm out from behind him. He held open the door.

Harry nudged a small pile of twigs with the toe of his trainer.

"Give it to me, please." Sirius' tone wasn't harsh, but his words dampened the atmosphere like a rain cloud.

The cloak seemed to burn Harry's skin through his t-shirt. Without looking up, he yanked it out of his jacket and pushed it toward his godfather.

A small moment of silence. The tavern door squeaked closed. Harry maimed the twigs with a soft crunch of his sole.

Sirius quietly forced a frog out of his throat. "All right," he said for the second time. "Let's go."

"We can't, Sirius." Harry kicked a stick into the street.

"And why's this?"

Harry stood there, staring at the cobblestone; he cracked a knuckle. He couldn't nark on his best friends. He just couldn't.

"You're not going to answer me now?"

Pondering this, Harry shrugged, with effort. "No, it's not that…"

"Then what is this about?"

Harry bit his lip; he wanted so much to tell Sirius. But even Ron and Hermione had said—

"This isn't a joke."

Harry dared to glance up into the dark eyes that reflected the coolness in his godfather's tone. His stomach lurched. He opened his mouth halfway, his brain scrambling for a response, but suddenly, Remus cleared his throat. Harry turned his head, only to witness Remus coughing into his fist once more.

"I'll just go wait by the gate—or the apparition poi—well, no…" He crossed his arms tightly, "the gate."

They stared at him.

Remus raised his eyebrows as if to say something, and then, changing his mind, turned and walked toward the path.

Harry watched him go until Sirius' voice snapped him out of his reverie.

"…trusted you with that, Harry."

Passersby were beginning to gawk. Sirius and Harry been standing on the sidewalk for a good five minutes now, and by the way Sirius was bearing down on him, it was obvious which one of them was getting blasted. "Listen," Harry began lamely, "I shouldn't have taken it without telling you, Sirius—"

"_Asking_ me."

Embarrassment tickled Harry's insides. "Same difference," he muttered.

"Not especially…"

Harry squinted. "You and Remus took my dad's cloak all the time, and Remus even said you lot got in trouble, but you still used it…" The argument was beside the point, but knowing his friends would be waiting for him in the storage room at Honeydukes by now seemed to ruffle his defenses.

Sirius wetted his lips, turning his back to the street. "We're not talking about me," he said with a shake of his head, "or Remus."

"But it's the same thing!"

"No." Sirius raised his eyebrows, lowering his chin to match Harry's glare. "It's not. At all. We made loads of mistakes when we were young, and if your granddad would have found out about half of what we did..." He let the prospect hang in the air.

"But Sirius—"

"We're not arguing about this in public anymore. Let's go." He reached out, but Harry pulled back, just a bit.

"Wait…"

"I'd rather not cause a scene, Harry James," Sirius warned quietly, "but if I have to throw you over my shoulder, I will. Lucky for me, you've barely grown—"

"Just wait a minute!" Harry pleaded, taking one more baby step backwards into a wooden post. "I'll tell you…just…you have to promise you won't go mental."

"I'm way past that," Sirius informed, tucking his hands into the crooks of his elbows, as if hanging on to his very last shred of patience. "This conversation is making me mental…"

Harry pulled a pathetic face. "Sirius, listen," he mumbled in a last-ditch effort. "Please."

Dragging a hand over his face, Sirius looked at him for a long time. Finally, he sighed. "Go on."

A bit startled by the immediate fold, Harry shifted. "Erm…" he stammered, settling on stuffing his hands into his back pockets, "well… I got a letter from Hermione this morning."

Sirius didn't say anything, opting instead to wait quietly, his knuckles pressed into his chin.

"Yeah, well," Harry continued, "anyway, she wrote me to tell me about Professor Moody…"

At this, Sirius frowned. "Moody? What about him?"

Harry proceeded to explain how Hermione had gone on for two pages about how she had accidentally seen Professor Moody in the corridor—ranting about foiled plans and idiot wizards—Harry's name had sneaked in there somehow, but Hermione hadn't been specific about that part.

Pressing his shoulder blades into the post, Harry peeked up at Sirius over the rims of his glasses.

His godfather's fist was jammed against his mouth in thought. "I don't understand," Sirius muttered through his fingers, mostly to himself. "That doesn't sound like Alastor. He's a bit intense about his work but… Hermione's certain of what she saw?"

Harry shrugged. "Dunno… I guess so. I mean, Hermione isn't really wrong about things…"

"So," Sirius continued, folding his arms over his chest again, "what does this have to do with taking the cloak to Hogsmeade?"

"Oh."

Another small frown. "Oh, what?"

"Er… it's just..." Harry scratched his cheek. "Hermione Floo'd me when you were in the shower…"

Sirius' forehead contorted as he tried to piece everything together. "And?"

This was it. Unfortunately for Harry, the whole story sounded stupider by the second…

"And she asked me to meet her and Ron in Hogsmeade…"

Sirius considered this. "Did you tell her we were going to lunch?"

Harry shook his head quickly. "No… it just sort of happened that way. After yesterday, she wasn't sure you'd want them over at the house, you know?"

"Not really…"

If only those creases would iron out on Sirius' forehead. He was looking rather cross now.

"You still haven't told me about the cloak," Sirius reminded him.

"I know," Harry mumbled, his chin nearly touching his chest. "That's the part you might go mental over."

A long, slow sigh whooshed from Sirius' nose. "Were you going to meet them at Hogwarts instead?"

Harry's eyes snapped up. "No," he said quickly, shaking his head in surprise. "Not there—Honeydukes…"

"Hon…" Sirius trailed off, squinting again. "_Harry_," he scolded in a whisper, "Hermione and Ron would have had to leave the grounds without permission—it's not a Hogsmeade weekend for another month."

Harry's chin officially drooped to his chest.

"They did leave the grounds," Sirius answered for him in a tight voice.

Harry went for the safest response: silence.

Another gusty sigh. "Harry James Potter…"

"What?" Harry mumbled, toeing the ground again, as Sirius rarely uttered his full name. "It's not like I begged them to come." He could feel Sirius' glare. Banging his heel against the post, Harry went for the amendment , "I mean… Hermione doesn't break rules, Sirius." He dared to glance up. "So I knew she was serious about wanting to talk. I couldn't just say no—"

"You _could_ have just told me about this, Harry," his godfather said stiffly. "You know I wouldn't have been angry over that."

Adopting his own crossed-arms stance, Harry dropped eye contact, stewing over Sirius' words. "You're angry now."

"I am a bit angry now, yes," Sirius confirmed.

Harry deflated completely.

"But mostly, I'm disappointed…"

Swallowing against a dry throat, Harry kicked the post with his heel again, at a loss for what to say.

Sirius coughed lightly. "Well…" He combed his fingers through his hair, peering down the street. "We'd best go to Honeydukes."

"Wait, Sirius," Harry said, pushing himself straight. "Don't—I mean…" The dullness in Sirius' eyes was painful to look at. "Hermione was only thinking of me, you know… she would never have come if—she just doesn't do things like that…"

"I know." Sirius nodded weakly. Stuffing his hands into his pockets, he gestured with his elbow before stepping onto the cobblestone. "Jiffy up."

"But Sirius—"

"I don't know what I have to do," Sirius said firmly as he turned, "to make you understand that _this_," He nodded over his shoulder in the direction of Honeydukes, "isn't what should happen when you find yourself in trouble." He eyed Harry sternly, his mouth pressed into a thin line. "You know this isn't the time to be wandering about on your own—even when you think you're safe. And you _know_," Sirius continued, "how to refuse to go along with an idea that will get you into deeper trouble. You're certainly smarter than I was at your age…"

Harry blinked against the bright sun, his skin suddenly hot all over.

"I'm sorry you didn't feel as though you could come to me about this, Bub," Sirius said, gently this time, his eyes clouding with hurt, only for a second. His hands wormed their way back into his pockets. "But you're going to have to face the music—your friends as well."

Harry stared after Sirius, feeling even worse than he had before, as he watched his godfather turn and gaze down the street, his shoulders curled as if waiting for Harry to fall in step behind him.

Harry did, eventually.

Dragging his feet, he stewed over Sirius' words, surprised at how rotten he felt… and how angry… Somewhere, deep in the burbling acid pit of his stomach, Harry was vaguely aware of his own guilt. But he couldn't help feeling irritated over Sirius' lack of understanding. Hermione and Ron were his best friends—what was he supposed to have done? Hadn't Remus just told him that he and Sirius and his dad had sneaked out with the cloak for lesser reasons? If anyone should sympathize, it should be Sirius…

The roof of Honeydukes loomed closer as they rounded the corner, still marching along in single file. Sirius had only glanced back once to make sure that Harry was following him. He stopped in front of the entrance, waiting; Sirius held open the door.

Harry's stomach turned over, but he gazed straight ahead, intent on masking his nervousness and embarrassment. He would have given anything to miss the look of mortification that would pale Hermione's face any second now.

Sirius kept walking toward the back of the store, nodding at the smiling man behind the counter—Mr. Flume, the owner. Harry plodded along between the rows of lollypops and fizzing whizbees, fighting the urge to pull Sirius back by his shirtsleeve and plead his case one last time.

As they neared the door that lead to the cellar, Sirius glanced carelessly back toward the counter; he picked up a package of fudge from one of the shelves and turned it over in his hands.

After a moment, the bell hanging over the door tinkled loudly, and almost immediately, Mr. Flume greeted whoever had come through. Judging by the high chatter, and the way the shopkeeper was smiling, Harry guessed it was a family with several small children. Slipping out from behind the counter, Flume strolled over to pounce on his newest potential customers.

Sirius gave a final glance toward the front of the store before dropping the fudge back on the shelf. Opening the door just a crack, he grabbed a hold of Harry's wrist and pulled the both of them in.

"Sirius…" Harry whispered in the darkness, startled out of his sour silence. "You should have used the cloak!"

"It's all right," Sirius muttered from behind. He was still clutching Harry's wrist tightly. "Careful, there're some stairs here."

"I know…"

Sirius pressed his palm against Harry's back, urging him forward. But Harry only wiggled his shoulder blades in response.

"Stop."

The order was quiet… calm, even. But strangely, Harry felt stung by it all the same. He descended the stairs with cat-like steps, Sirius' footing just as soft and meticulous.

Suddenly, a stair creaked loudly. They froze; Sirius' fingertips clamped onto both of Harry's shoulders now. Harry had no idea who was at fault for the noise, but at this point, it didn't matter. It wasn't until Sirius spoke that he realized he was holding his breath.

"Did you hear that?" Sirius barely breathed into his ear.

Harry nodded, and then realizing Sirius probably couldn't see him, he whispered, "Yes."

"Is it—"

"Yeah," Harry answered, reading Sirius' mind, "I'm pretty sure."

"It sounded like the trapdoor."

They went down the remaining few steps together. Harry was holding his breath again; his heartbeat was a bass drum in his ears. He knew Ron and Hermione were waiting beneath the dusty cellar trapdoor. And he was almost positive he could hear Hermione's shrill, panicked whisper.

As Harry's feet hit solid ground, he exhaled with relief. He squinted against the dull blue light that had filled the room; he watched dazedly as Sirius squatted and eased the trap door open, poking his illuminated wand inside.

"Oh!" Hermione exclaimed breathily.

Ron was gawking up at Sirius with round eyes, his mouth half-open; a mixture of shock and fright flashed through Hermione's face. She clamped her lips together, her shoulders visibly slumping when she spotted Harry, who was grateful for the dimness, as he knew his whole face was red.

"Come on out," Sirius said softly. He held his hand out to Hermione. "Quietly, now."

Hermione's knees were trembling as she hoisted herself onto the stone floor. Harry felt a wave of guilt wash over him.

"And, you," Sirius said to Ron, offering his help.

None of them spoke as Ron straightened and brushed flecks of dirt from his jumper. Harry could sense Hermione's eyes on him, but he just couldn't look at her. He felt very small.

"Ron," Sirius addressed the redhead first, "you and Hermione risked a great deal coming here. You know that?" Ron's ears burned pink, even in the eerie blue glow of the cellar.

"Sirius…" Harry tried. But his godfather immediately held up a hand to shush him. Pinning Harry with a solemn stare, he gave a tiny shake of his head.

"It was my fault, Sirius," Hermione whispered croakily. "I shouldn't have asked Harry to come—I knew it was a horrible idea."

"Well, seeing as you've made it this far, you couldn't have thought it was that horrible…" Sirius' weak attempt at humor had quite the opposite effect, even on him.

In a rare display of defeat, Hermione lowered her eyes, clearly ashamed of herself.

A slow frown darkened Harry's face. "I came because I knew what you wanted to tell me was important, Hermione," he assured her, deliberately avoiding Sirius' gaze, even in his peripheral vision. "You wouldn't have broken the rules for nothing…"

"Harry."

"You're not even letting her explain—"

"Hush," Sirius muttered, his eyes wide and insistent as they flashed toward the staircase. "Keep your voice down."

Wetting his lips, Harry lowered his volume, whispering, reminding him, "She saw Professor Moody go mental, Sirius…"

Raking a hand through his hair, Sirius seemed to be considering this. But then he shook his head. "Well," he said calmly, "he _is_ quite mental… in a way, but…" He eyed all three of them. "It just doesn't fit."

Harry gave him a furrowed look. "Fit how?"

The floor boards groaned overhead, causing Harry to nearly jump out of his skin. A muffled voice was near enough to reach the cellar—too near.

Gesturing with a wave of his hand, Sirius gathered the three of them together, herding them into a corner. He shook out the invisibility cloak and threw it over their heads, pressing a finger to his lips before crouching silently behind a nearby crate, completely out of sight.

Harry could feel Ron's hot breath on his neck, but he didn't move. Hermione was gripping his shirtsleeve, nearly dragging his collar off his shoulder.

A few more creaks sounded from above, but then there was silence. They waited another minute, and then Sirius reappeared. Harry pulled the cloak down, holding it under his chin; Hermione's bushy hair materialized, tickling his cheek. He could feel the static that had attacked his own hair, making it stand up all over, but he ignored it. He glanced toward Hermione, but she was watching Sirius with a mixture of worry and curiosity.

"All right," Sirius breathed, still eyeing the staircase. "Hermione, you and Ron are to go back the way you came—no stops."

"It's a straight path…"

"Shh!" Sirius shushed Harry quite sharply this time, frowning at him until Harry dropped his gaze, feeling rather warm again. Sirius really wasn't kidding; he was angry.

"I doubt it's anything to worry over, but I'll be in touch with Dumbledore about Moody," Sirius said softly, nodding towards Hermione, as though to reassure her that her concern was valid, "and I'll be sending word about what happened today," he continued, though now, his eyes had strayed to the moldy crates.

Harry's mouth fell open. He could feel Hermione stiffen beside him. Ron sucked in a breath.

Sirius had slipped the cloak from Harry's weak grasp. He tilted his head toward the trapdoor. "Go on, now. Straight to Gryffindor Tower—and be careful."

Wordlessly, Hermione walked toward the secret exit with Ron in tow, who glanced over his shoulder at Harry, his freckled face drawn in disbelief.

Harry's mouth still hung slack as he watched his friends proceed into the tunnel with funeral-march solemnity. For the second time that weekend, he was mortified. There was no way Sirius could brush off this one.

Shaking out the cloak again, Sirius kept his eyes averted. "Here, put this on." But before Sirius could drape it over him, Harry moved his head a bit.

"So, that's it?" Harry croaked. "You're just going to let them get in trouble…"

"They got themselves into trouble, Harry," Sirius replied still looking down. "And you know it. Here…" Sirius tried to drape the cloak again. "You won't be seen—"

"If Hermione and Ron are in for it, then so am I," Harry argued, feeling stubborn and reckless, feeling stupid as well, but the stubbornness prevailed.

Sirius sniffed in a rather depressed way. "Don't worry," he mumbled, pushing the cloak towards Harry instead. "You are."

Harry tried to glare, but it didn't quite work with the pathetic thick swallow that rippled his throat.

They took the stairs together, saying nothing, even as they reached the top. Sirius moved Harry away from the doorknob. "Put the cloak on," he barely whispered.

Listlessly, Harry obeyed.

Twisting the knob slowly and silently, Sirius peered through a tiny crack in the door. An instant later, Sirius stepped down and guided a now invisible Harry in the place he'd just occupied. "Quickly," he breathed in Harry's ear. "And wait for me by the tall shelves. Don't uncover until I tell you." He opened the door and gave Harry a gentle nudge. "Go."

Harry moved swiftly, his heart pounding. He could hear Flume's grainy voice, but Harry couldn't see him behind the counter.

Suddenly, Harry felt movement behind him. He squeezed his eyes shut.

"Ambrosius, love…" A passing wind whipped Harry's cloak about his ankles. Cracking one eye open, he caught sight of a woman's robes as she bustled down the aisle and toward her husband. "I've got another parcel in the cellar."

Harry jerked his head toward the cellar door, his chest tightening in panic, but just then, as if appearing out of thin air, Sirius was at his shoulder. He glanced around until Harry peeked through an opening in his cloak. Sirius spotted him almost immediately; pulling Harry close, Sirius freed him from the cloak in one smooth movement; he balled up the slippery material and shoved it under his jacket.

-----

The crunch of dry grass was the only sound in Harry's ears as he trudged along, several steps away from Sirius and Remus, to the Apparition point outside of the Hogsmeade gates. They'd barely spoken—not even Remus.

And Harry didn't even have the heart to mentally build up his defense as they walked the half mile over the grassy knolls. His brain was buzzing. He was only aware of the fresh argument that would no doubt commence as soon as Remus Apparated to his own house. His stomach felt heavy, as though he'd eaten rocks for lunch.

When they arrived, Remus said a quick goodbye, his voice scratchy, waterlogged, somehow, with emotion that Harry couldn't pinpoint. Harry could only nod in response.

"Thanks, mate," Sirius said quietly.

Harry flattened part of an old acid pop wrapper with his shoe into the dirt. A few seconds of silence, and then _crack_; Remus was gone.

"We're next."

Dragging his feet again, Harry went and stood near his godfather. He gazed out over the hills without really seeing much of the green.

Sirius sighed quietly. "What do you suppose I do, then?"

Harry looked at him; Sirius had wrinkled his nose against the bright white of the sky.

"I'm not about to pretend that what you three planned was clever, Harry," Sirius continued without humor. "So if you're waiting for me to tell you made the right choice…"

"I'm not waiting for anything," Harry retorted, his voice high and strange-sounding. "I took the cloak without asking; I know you're angry at me."

"Worried, is more like it," Sirius said, holding his hair out of his face as it blew in the wind. "This isn't like you."

"Maybe it is…"

"It absolutely isn't."

"It's not like you to rat out my friends to Dumbledore," Harry shot back. "They were only trying to help—"

"They were out-of-bounds, Harry; they could be in serious trouble—especially so soon after all this happened with you and the Tournament."

Harry sniffed bitterly. "Well, they will be now, won't they?"

"It was a foolish thing to do; a needless risk, and you know better."

The warm breeze burned Harry's eyes as he stood with his feet planted in the dirt like a tree stump, blinking like a bewildered dolt. A bewildered and fuming dolt. "No, I guess don't."

Sirius' shirt tails fluttered round his waist as he stared. "You know what?"

Harry swallowed dryly, feeling as though he'd hit the eye of the storm.

"I've had it," Sirius said evenly, though his eyes alone were scowling. He took Harry by the arm before he could react.

An instant later, the world was a kaleidoscope of colors, swirling, sucking the breath from Harry's lungs, until everything came back together in the form of the cabin living room.

Harry wobbled a bit until Sirius steadied him. He was immediately guided toward the stairs.

"You can spend the afternoon in your room until you're ready to listen."

"Wait—hang on," Harry protested, digging his heels. "I'm not—Sirius, stop, I've been listening. I'm listening now!"

Sirius urged him up the first step. "You're practically shouting now…"

Harry tried to twist around. "Stop treating me like a baby!"

"Up you go."

"Stop it!"

Sirius managed to walk him up to the top landing before Harry jerked away in anger. "What is _wrong _with you?" Harry sputtered.

But Sirius was insistent in his ushering. "Unless you'd like to have your dinner up here as well—"

"Fine, bloody send it, then!" Harry managed to squirm away until Sirius caught him by the shirt sleeve… and then an armpit.

The hand that whacked Harry's backside, however, nearly sent him tripping over his own trainers, past the threshold of his bedroom. The sting instantly assaulted him, startling him just long enough to allow Sirius to guide him the rest of the way in.

But not for long.

Harry pulled away sharply, his cheeks pulsing with lava-like anger. "I'm fourteen, you know!"

"Sit." Sirius pointed to the bed.

"You want me to listen, but you haven't!"

"I'll hear you out once you've calmed yourself," Sirius informed him, in the same smooth tone, though his chest was heaving. "I don't fancy listening to a tantrum."

How a single word could strike such a tender nerve…

Harry shot him a pinched frown. "Then stop telling me what to do, Sirius, you're not my—" He froze just in time.

Or perhaps not. Sirius' face slowly contorted with the most peculiar expression. He closed his mouth, swallowing, staring.

Harry blinked, stunned by his own words. A warmth spread through his scalp like melting wax.

Sirius' fingers twitched against his trousers.

And still, Harry stood there, blinking.

Glancing away slightly, as though confused, or maybe embarrassed, Sirius brushed a long strand of fringe from his temple before making his way back toward the staircase, leaving Harry's door wide open.

TBC...

* * *

**Author's Note: **A long chapter for you, considering my recent lack of writing and general failure at life... ;-) Hope you enjoyed. I'll have Chapter five up this weekend. I know it's been a while since I've updated my other story (or this one for that matter) but I'm always, always thinking about my stories. I will never abandon them, even if it takes me another year to complete them. Thanks for your patience.


	6. Chapter Five

**Chapter Five**

Long after the stairs stopped creaking, Harry stood in the middle of his bedroom rug.

And then, finding his bed two steps behind him, he sat. His room was so quiet, that his eardrums were humming.

Harry stayed on his bed for a long time, attempting to sort out the fiery knot of nerves in his stomach. The afternoon's argument replayed over and over in his head, his own hour's-worth of complaints seeming less and less significant as each moment passed—stupid, even. His eyes kept watering, but each time, Harry blinked them dry again, forcing himself to remember that this wasn't his fault.

But still, those awful words clanged like a cathedral bell.

Harry's ears were buzzing now.

He couldn't fix this one.

* * *

The only sound in the sitting room was the too-loud ticking of the too-large clock that hung over the fireplace.

That damn, confident-looking clock that happily ticked away the seconds of the day, each second adding to the amount of time his godson sat upstairs in his bedroom, hating him. Not to mention, adding to the long minutes Sirius had sat slumping on the sofa, his arm slung over his eyes. Each tick reminded him how dreadfully long it was going to take to fix this—if things could be fixed at all. A blank sheet of parchment and a fresh quill lay untouched on the next cushion.

Sirius sighed into the crook of his elbow. His mother's temper. That damn, irrational inheritance…

Harry's tantrum, indeed.

What a hypocritical, rubbish godfather he was…

Sirius was so lost in his own self-loathing that he barely heard the Floo roar to life.

"This isn't the best time, is it?"

By this point, Sirius had stuffed the closest square pillow into the crook of his arm, so it could cover his face as well. Startled by the voice in the near-silence, Sirius sat up abruptly; the pillow tumbled to the floor.

"Remus?" he mumbled, smoothing his hair back as he tried to shake off his doldrums-induced stupor.

The dull green light of the flames accentuated the lines under Remus' eyes and the vertical wrinkle of worry between his brows. "Everything all right?" Remus asked, only his head floating among the hearth. "I can come back—"

"No," Sirius said, rather drearily as he rubbed at his eyes. "Come on through. You'll be my only company for a good week, I'm thinking…" He picked up the pillow from the floor and tossed it onto the armchair.

Having Floo'd the rest of the way over, Remus brushed a bit of soot from his shoulders and removed his shoes before stepping off of the old rug in front of the fireplace and walking over to the sofa. He sat down next to Sirius, who had exchanged his slump for a slouch, his elbows on his knees, his hair hanging over his ears as he absently laced and unlaced his fingers.

"Harry's upstairs?" Remus inquired as though he already knew the answer.

Sirius nodded anyway. "Plotting my overthrow…"

"I doubt that." When Sirius didn't say anything, Remus reached into his pocket. "Harry left this at my house this morning," he said, pulling out a curled piece of folded parchment. "I wasn't sure if it was an assignment he'd got from one of his professors; I barely opened it—thought I'd bring it by just in case it was important. I think it's a letter."

Sirius nodded his thanks, taking the letter between his fingers, still unsmiling.

"Really, I don't have to stay—"

"I don't know what I'm doing, Remus."

Remus shifted a bit, allowing the words to hang in the air. "What do you mean?"

Sirius' only response was a slow shake of his head.

"How do you figure, Mate?" Remus asked again, scooting towards the edge of his cushion. "Sirius?"

"I lost my temper…"

"We all do," Remus reassured him. He threaded his fingers together, like Sirius had, as he waited for a response. When he didn't get one, Remus pressed a bit more: "Harry won't be angry with you forever, Sirius, he's only fourteen. They don't fancy punishment—we certainly didn't." A feeble smile tilted his lips.

"I didn't punish him," Sirius muttered, rather unmoved by Remus' attempt at consolation. "Not really."

"Well," Remus tried again, "he's no stranger to scolding."

"It wasn't even that…"

Shifting again, Remus bowed his head, as though to ask a question, and then, deciding against it, straightened up again. He was silent for a moment.

"Bloody idiot…" Sirius berated himself, rubbing at his forehead.

"I shouldn't have made Harry give you the cloak," Remus said softly. "I should have just told you about it after lunch and let you handle it…that was very bad on my part. It wasn't my place."

Glancing over, Sirius frowned. "You knew he'd brought it?"

"I saw it under the table," Remus replied. "I gave him the chance to come clean—I didn't want to interfere—but I'm afraid I made everything worse…"

"So he was going to use it, then." Sirius seemed to be studying the carpet.

"He said he wasn't," Remus admitted somewhat hesitantly.

"Of course he said that…"

"I didn't really believe him."

A pause. "Do you really think he would have?"

Remus shrugged. "I don't know. Probably… if he made the effort to take it along."

Sirius shook his head again. "Why couldn't he come to me?"

"Because he knew what he was doing was wrong." Remus leaned over a bit. "Where was he headed, anyway?"

"Honeydukes… to meet his friends…" Briefly, unenthusiastically, Sirius related to Remus the story about Alastor Moody. Remus listened, agreeing with Sirius that, although Moody was a strange bloke, it wasn't like him to lose control for no reason."

"You're talking about Ron and Hermione, aren't you?"

"Mmhm." At Remus' odd tone, Sirius eyed him suspiciously. "Why?"

"Well, that makes quite a bit of sense, doesn't it?" Remus reasoned. "The three of them stick together like glue."

"I know," Sirius claimed, shrugging, "but…" he trailed off.

"If they asked him to come, it's no wonder he did."

Sirius appeared rather confused now. "Why do you say that?"

"Think of the three of us," Remus said. "Didn't you and James use the Floo one summer when you were twelve without his father knowing? During that first full moon? You came to see about me."

"Only we never _got_ to see you," Sirius replied, his eyes shining with the slightest hint of amusement for the first time since lunch. "Your dad sent us home. We got our arses warmed as soon as our feet hit the floor; James might have still had one foot in the fireplace…"

Remus gave him a half-smile.

"Merlin, for bright kids, we were thick."

"But you still came…"

"For you, yeah." Sirius brushed his hair away from his face. "Of course we did."

"You see, then?"

Sirius gave a meager shrug. "I suppose. Although, now you've just reminded me of my age…"

"Teaching made me feel mine."

Smiling sadly to himself, Sirius trained his eyes on the carpet again.

"I know you hate arguing with him," Remus stated. "But it's obvious you two care very much for each other."

Sirius cracked a knuckle, his ears pinking.

"What?"

A rare blush colored Sirius' face. "He said I shouldn't tell him what to do." Sirius glanced over at Remus. "You're smirking…"

"Sorry," Remus apologized, tightening his lips against a slight grin as he lowered his chin.

"It's not funny, mate."

"You've really become his father, haven't you?" Smoothing back his sandy fringe, Remus gazed at Sirius fondly.

Sirius could only stare at him.

"I remember a time when Charles Potter heard those exact words from James…_and _you."

* * *

It had to have been at least ten minutes since Harry had plopped down on the next-to-last step, listening from the kitchen, as much as he could hear, anyway. In reality, all he could make out were a load of murmurs and throat clearing. But he knew Remus' voice well enough to identify even his mumbling.

Harry wasn't sure why he had sat on the staircase for so long. He wasn't even really sure what had made him come downstairs in the first place, except that he knew if he had stayed in the smothering silence of his bedroom for one more minute, he was absolutely sure he would have died up there.

The last time he'd parked his backside on this staircase for no apparent reason, he'd been in trouble then as well. Somehow, he hadn't felt as horrid as he did now. Then again, he hadn't dug himself this deep either.

After a while, Harry recognized the heavy whoosh of the Floo. And the mumbling had stopped. He couldn't help but wonder if Remus hated him now, too, not that Harry would blame him.

Working up the nerve, Harry forced himself to walk through the kitchen, figuring the least he could do was size up the look on Sirius' face, before deciding if his best bet would be to pack up and take the Knight Bus to the Leaky Cauldron, seeing as Ron and Hermione would probably never speak to him again either.

Sirius was sitting on the sofa, instead of in his favorite chair with the reading lamp next to it; his head was against the back cushions, and his legs were sticking straight out, as if he'd fallen asleep sitting upright.

Harry stood by the arm, wondering if he shouldn't just back out slowly. But Sirius must have sensed him standing there, because he eventually craned his neck around. Catching sight of Harry, Sirius pushed himself up a bit.

They stared at each other.

"Hey," Sirius said, his brows knitting together, as though he were asking a question.

Harry's teeth snagged his bottom lip.

Sirius' brows were still pinched, but for some reason, he didn't look angry. He looked almost startled.

Harry moved over to the far end of the sofa and sat down, mashing his lower back against the arm like he always did. He crossed his ankles, sitting sideways, facing Sirius. He tucked his hands between his legs.

Harry peeked up over the rims of his glasses and then studied his thumbnails; he wasn't sure where to start.

Thank goodness Sirius was.

"I think we really need to talk about today," Sirius said quietly.

"I didn't mean to say that," Harry mumbled, his throat feeling sore. "It was really stupid."

"Say what?"

Lifting his chin, Harry eyed his godfather warily. What was he playing at?

Sirius gave him a twitch of a smile—mostly with his eyes. "We need to talk about Ron and Hermione…"

"About Moody?"

"No," Sirius said as he twisted against the arm of the sofa, mirroring Harry, and stretched out a leg, "not about Moody; I'm still thinking that over. I want to talk about this morning."

Harry drew his knees up, digging his bare toes between the cushions.

"Were you really afraid I wouldn't take you seriously?" Sirius asked, his forehead creasing again, this time in a very different way. "Did you think I wouldn't believe Hermione?"

Harry opened his mouth, and then closed it, thinking. He could have sworn it all made sense at the time… Hadn't Hermione said not to tell? Well, no, she hadn't. She had barely spoken above a frantic whisper while her head was sticking out of the fireplace. It had all seemed very important. Or was it because—

"Have I lost you?"

Harry's brain came back into focus. "I dunno."

Sirius was running the pad of his thumb across his lips, over and over. "Were you still angry about yesterday?"

"No," Harry said, burying his feet even deeper. "Yeah… I mean, I don't know why I agreed. Hermione said it was important."

"Did she?"

Harry dropped his eyes, feeling like an idiot. Sirius still didn't seem angry—not like a half hour ago when Harry could have sworn his bum had been smacked off into the next room like a bludger. But there was something about godfather's face, frank but gentle, something familiar, that was just hard to look at.

"Listen, Sirius," Harry mumbled, dragging both feet from the depths of the sofa and dangling one off the cushion. "I say dumb things sometimes, and I don't mean them."

Drawing his own knee up, Sirius considered him.

Harry scrubbed his big toe along the rug. "I really didn't mean what I said."

"Oy," Sirius said softly, poking Harry's ankle with his stocking toes. "You're not the only one with a quick mouth, apparently."

Leaning into the forearm draped over his kneecap, Harry pressed his nose against his wrist. He knew what Sirius was doing, but he didn't want any of it. Unlike his own monumental blunder, Harry doubted there was anything Sirius had said or done that burned like fire inside of _his_ memory.

Sirius poked him again with his toe. "I know you didn't."

Sighing, Harry balanced his chin now. Sirius couldn't know.

"We're not going to mention that again, all right?"

Harry watched him through his fringe, unsure of what to say.

"What bothers me, though," Sirius continued, grimacing a bit as he lifted his backside to yank out a bulky pillow from underneath his tailbone, "is that you broke your own rule…"

Harry jammed his nose against his hand again, blinking at the blurred paleness of his own skin.

"Even when you're cross with me for whatever reason," Sirius said, "you can't disobey like that—I don't even want you to consider it," he clarified. "Especially not when it involves your safety…"

"I know," Harry mumbled dejectedly. "I didn't think about it."

"I don't think any of you did…"

Harry swallowed, feeling even smaller than he did in the sweet shop cellar.

"You're not to work these problems out on your own, Harry," Sirius chided, more gently than he ever had before. "Not anymore. Ron and Hermione need to learn that as well."

"They didn't mean it."

"I know they didn't," Sirius said. "I can even understand why they thought it would be better to tell you without my knowing." A smile crept into Sirius' voice. His eyes shone. "A bit, anyway…"

Harry's glasses had begun sliding down his nose, and he nudged them up with his fingers.

"Even so, it's not as it should be, is it?"

Harry's teeth pulled at his lip again as he shook his head.

"No," Sirius agreed. "It took me a long time to finally understand that. And I was well past your age."

"Are you still going to write to Dumbledore?

A brief pause. "Remus offered to go to Hogwarts to explain what happened instead. But, yes, before that I was going to write."

Harry could have sworn there were fish swimming around in his stomach. He knew where this was headed, although, he wasn't sure if the slippery feeling in his gut was new or still lingering.

"Harry?"

Recognizing the solemnity in the summons, Harry looked up, meeting gray eyes that matched Sirius' tone quite well.

"I don't want this to happen again," Sirius said clearly. "Even on good intentions."

Shaking his head adamantly, Harry hugged his knees once more. "It won't."

"I think we'd best make certain…"

Harry stared.

Arm still draped over his knee, his godfather quirked an eyebrow.

Sitting up a bit, Harry made a face. It didn't even need to be spelled out for him; he knew what was coming. "Sirius…" Harry groaned.

But any further complaints were cut off as Sirius suddenly scooted forward and palmed the back of Harry's head; pulling him forward, he pressed a quick, rough kiss against the messy hair. They stayed that way for a moment, and then Sirius squeezed the base of Harry's neck and eased up off of the sofa.

Harry began to stand, too, feeling as though he were standing on legs made of pudding, but Sirius put a hand on his shoulder.

"Wait here a moment."

Sitting back, Harry tried to nod, but he ended up swallowing instead.

The kitchen floor creaked with Sirius' footsteps.

Harry's eyes watered again, and this time he couldn't keep the tears from sliding down his cheeks and onto his t-shirt. He brushed them away with his wrists, but they kept falling, silent and insistent.

Even when Sirius' footsteps returned as carpet-shuffles again—sitting room footsteps—Harry kept his head ducked; he was embarrassed to have a face wet with tears already, but there wasn't much he could do about it.

Sirius acted as though he didn't notice.

Silently, Harry removed his glasses and handed them over. He stood slowly—his heart hammering.

The following process was a blur, and Harry's tears continued; he blinked away what he could before he came face-to-face with the sofa cushion. But he heard them plinking on the fabric anyway. His midsection was lifted briefly as Sirius readjusted him—and removed things—as quickly as possible.

Harry sniffed deeply in the silence—vulnerability eating him alive. His chest felt splintery.

More noiseless tears.

He already knew, without a doubt, that this would be the last time. If only his promises could be worth anything to his godfather anymore…

Sirius tensed. Harry held his breath.

The sting was sharp and honest. No worse than last time, but shocking, nonetheless. The awful anticipatory tingling that had settled in the only place that made sense had now shot to Harry's toes. It took only one more firm smack of the worn sole against bare skin before Harry's vocal chords were reawakened. A literal reality slap.

Two more, and Harry gave up all stoicism. He squirmed involuntarily—felt the sobs starting—and squirmed some more.

Sirius waited patiently; he held his forearm across Harry's shoulders until he settled down, pressing his cheek against the cushion; he gave Harry's neck a reassuring squeeze. "Almost done here." Sirius' voice was thin and throaty.

Harry barely noticed the next two; he only hoped it would be over soon so he could apologize.

A long pause. He felt Sirius' other arm resting at his knee hollows.

"Listen to me," Sirius said gently.

Harry sniffed; a pathetic response.

"I don't want to see you take yourself for granted anymore." Sirius struggled over the words. "You're worth too much to me, Harry—" Sirius' voice cut out and then came back, firm. "Do you hear me?"

Harry tried to nod, but his face screwed up tightly. Sirius had a way of making everything seem so simple, so obvious. And Harry felt ashamed of himself; he felt even more vulnerable, but, most importantly, he felt grateful. He knew exactly what Sirius meant. His godfather was the only one who understood how _Harry_ had felt all his life. Worthless.

The final slap was quick, smarted impressively, but Harry's weeping remained soft and steady—cleansing tears.

Harry allowed Sirius to help him stand and pull up his clothing; he didn't even protest when Sirius drew him down on his sore backside to sit beside him. Sirius folded both arms over Harry's shoulders and rested his chin against Harry's dark head, holding him through the heaving breaths and disjointed apologies.

"I know, love," Sirius muttered, squeezing Harry even tighter against his torso. "I know."

Harry felt the tension melting away in his chest.

"We'll be all right."

* * *

The scrolls of the parlor wallpaper were muddled in dimness of the setting sun. Sirius had yet to light the lanterns.

He'd opted for a cup of peppermint tea with honey to ease his nerves and steady his still-trembling hands, rather than a glass from the half-empty bottle of dark-gold Firewhiskey that sat in the kitchen, inviting, but untouched.

He slumped down in the cushioned parlor chair, letting his head hang over the low backrest. Closing his eyes, Sirius took slow, deep breaths. Harry had been napping on his favorite spot on the sofa for nearly an hour now, two feather pillows under his head and his own comforter tucked underneath his armpit.

Yes, he knew Harry was fourteen, even though his kid's stature begged otherwise. And he would never, not if he lived to be as old as Albus Dumbledore, reckon with the fact that it was no one's job but his own to sit here in the aftermath of tears, wadded tissues, and unnecessary apologies, waiting for his hands to stop shaking, waiting for the muscles in his legs to stop twitching guiltily with nerves. He would never feel at peace with his job as a disciplinarian, as much as he wished he could.

But he did know that everything would, indeed, be fixed eventually. And his godson, now rolled into a blanket cocoon, would be just fine. Tonight, Harry was home, and he was safe.

Nothing mattered more than that.

Sirius opened his eyes and sat up.

Was that the Floo?

He set his teacup back on the mismatched saucer and pushed himself up. He felt drained—his whole body was sore. Napping would have been a lost cause, however. While Harry was exhausted but guilt-free, Sirius was guilt-ridden. Funny how a single spanking could wipe out the lot of them.

All of a sudden, a soft thump sounded in the living room.

Murmurs.

No, that definitely wasn't Remus.

Strolling faster through the kitchen, Sirius pushed back his hair and skidded to halt at the sight in the sitting room.

Blankets on the floor—squirming. Muffled whining.

Sirius bolted around the arm of the sofa, immediately crouching down next to the other man in the room, and reaching for Harry.

"He's still asleep—a nightmare," Dumbledore muttered under his breath as he leaned back a bit, sweeping his long white beard out of the way to allow Sirius to gather up his kid.

"Oh, Bub…" Sirius smoothed back Harry's fringe, holding him in the crook of his elbow until the green eyes fluttered open.

"His scar, again?"

"No, don't touch it," Sirius said gently as Harry immediately reached for the swollen ridge on his forehead. "We'll get a flannel."

"Allow me." With impressive agility for a man his age, Albus fairly glided into the next room, conjuring an ice-cold cloth.

Meanwhile, Sirius untangled Harry's blankets and propped him up against the foot of the sofa, unknowingly knocking over the empty flask that Dumbledore had left on the rug.

TBC...


	7. Chapter Six

**Chapter Six**

Harry was sitting on the floor, his feet still tangled in his quilt, scar stinging, and Sirius was staring at him, white-faced. His bleary form reached over to retrieve Harry's glasses from the side table.

"Same dream?"

Wiping the sweat out of his eyes—at least Harry hoped it was sweat—he shoved his glasses onto his nose and blinked back into focus. Yes, it had been the same dream. The same, but different. Flashes of contorted faces—a red, scaly _something_—still drifted through Harry's mind; the horrid, pain-filled screams reverberated like an echo. But whose screams?

That was definitely not the same.

"Harry?" Sirius tried again, but just then, Dumbledore emerged from the kitchen, carrying a folded, wet flannel. He handed it to Sirius, who pushed Harry's fringe back with one hand and brandished the cloth with the other. "Here, hold this on your scar."

Harry did. For a second, at least. "It's fine, Sirius," Harry said quietly, glancing sideways at Dumbledore, wanting nothing more than to crawl beneath the sofa cushions and pretend as though he hadn't rolled off of them in the first place. "It doesn't hurt."

A bad lie. Sirius would never buy it.

He didn't.

"No, it's inflamed." Sirius lifted Harry's wrist, forcing him to press the cold rag to his forehead again. "Hold it on."

Harry sat there, feeling very much like a soldier injured in combat… or a five year old who'd fallen off the monkey bars. Especially with Sirius _and_ Dumbledore now gawking at him.

Dumbledore.

Did he know about Hogsmeade already? Maybe he'd blasted Ron and Hermione and had now come to scold Harry as well…

Harry flushed, hoping with all his might that Dumbledore was ill-informed of the price Harry had already paid for _that_ escapade. "I'm fine," he repeated, as he slowly kicked the blanket away from his feet. "Really."

Of course he hadn't been napping from tear-soaked exhaustion.

Of course his eyes were only red from the wind.

Dumbledore might buy it. He would ignore it, at least…

Harry knew that much about the headmaster.

"Come up to the sofa," Sirius said gently, taking Harry's elbow to help him stand. "This old floor can't be comfy."

Harry didn't really need the help, but he decided not to make a fuss over it. Settling down, he flipped his flannel over to the colder side.

Sirius grimaced in concentration. "May I see?" he asked, squinting at Harry's forehead.

Harry showed him.

"Looks a bit better," Sirius decided.

Distractedly, Harry replaced the compress, watching as Professor Dumbledore stooped slightly to retrieve something lying near his foot, under the hem of his robes, then stood patiently, observing the scene, his velvet sleeve covering most of what was clenched in the old man's hand.

"What are you doing here, Professor?" Harry wondered, casting a sidelong glance toward his godfather, who seemed to have no objection to Harry's question, as he, too, was eyeing Dumbledore beneath furrowed brows.

Dumbledore smiled slightly. "Not exactly tactful of me, was it?"

Sirius drew in air through his nostrils, his eyes widening. "Oh, I…no—" Sirius palmed the back of his own flushed neck. "I mean, of course, Albus," he finished awkwardly. "You're always welcome here. Sit down."

Harry started to give Sirius a funny look, but then it occurred to him: the last time Sirius had spoken to Dumbledore, he'd stormed out of the castle, dragging Harry along with him. They hadn't exactly left things neat and tidy.

On a brighter note, at least Harry wasn't the only one feeling uncomfortable. He also wasn't the center of attention anymore: a double victory.

For now.

"If you don't mind," Dumbledore began, reaching into his pocket; Harry noticed the other bony hand sneaking the suspicious-looking pewter item into the other pouch, "I have just been sent the most interesting peppermint sugar crystals from Honeydukes, which, I believe, would be lovely in tea." He shook the small red and white striped package in his fingers.

"Of course," Sirius said again, moving into the kitchen. He halted at the threshold, backtracked toward Harry, lifting the cloth away from his forehead as if to check it, frowned vaguely, and then headed back towards the next room.

Harry squinted at him.

The sound of water sloshing against metal drifted in from the kitchen. Sirius swore in a whisper; he must have gotten splashed.

Water trickled more gently from the spigot.

"Shall we?" Dumbledore's enormous beard dipped towards the floor as he acknowledged Harry.

Not exactly sure what to say, Harry stood, the wet flannel balled up in his fist now; he tugged at his twisted t-shirt, creased from sofa-sleeping.

"I always find a soothing cup of tea to be the best medicine," Dumbledore said thoughtfully, as he extended a hand towards Harry's elbow, "for everything."

* * *

Harry sat at the kitchen table directly across from the headmaster, who, every half a minute or so, sucked in a burbling sip of sweet peppermint tea, his eyes twinkling as though he the sugar became more delicious with each taste. Harry drank butterbeer from the bottle. He was sick of tea. And in Dumbledore's case, several moments of silent tea-drinking rarely prefaced good news.

Slumping a bit in his seat, Sirius sat stirring his own cooling tea, saying nothing, except to ask Harry if he wanted a few biscuits to go with his drink.

Harry hadn't. Besides, he was too busy observing this silent scene. Dumbledore never made Harry feel nervous, so it wasn't as though he was afraid to speak. It was interesting, though: trying to guess who would talk first.

Harry ran the pad of his thumb down the glass ridges in his brown bottle of butterbeer. He had been watching Sirius carefully since they'd sat down. Every so often, his godfather would sneak the tiniest of glances in Harry's direction. Harry knew those looks; they were the same careful peeks of Sirius' that had measured Harry's mood on so many occasions: after the time Sirius had scolded Harry for leaving his wet swimming things on his bedroom floor…

Or perhaps during that first breakfast together after Harry had been grounded to his room for two days earlier in the summer…

And even after Sirius had knocked the old slipper off the bed—quite the ugliest slipper Harry had ever seen…or had the displeasure of feeling—so Harry didn't have to stare at its taunting curled toe any longer than he must…

These were Sirius' checking-up looks. Looks that betrayed his godfather's rather tranquil after-argument façade; looks that silently begged Harry not to hold a grudge against him.

Harry supposed he should; what fourteen year old wouldn't, after being taken down at least a half-dozen pegs in the past twenty-four hours? One fairly smarting peg, at that.

But for whatever reason, Harry felt more relieved than anything. He hadn't wanted to disappoint his friends by refusing to meet them in Hogsmeade, but he was also tired of being the one who had to worry about such things in the first place.

Plain knackered out.

Sirius was right; worrying about something—and trying to fix it alone—was far from worth it, especially when your friends' safety was involved. And your own.

It wasn't going to happen anymore, as far as Sirius was concerned. He had made it quite clear that it wasn't Harry's job to do so.

Simple as that.

As far as _Harry_ was concerned, he could handle simple. He couldn't, however, handle another moment of these looks from Sirius. Harry knew he had to be better. He would be.

Sirius cleared his throat, startling Harry out of his thoughts. A questioning wrinkle appeared between Sirius' gray eyes; he must have noticed Harry staring off into space.

Harry gave his godfather an inquisitive, squinty look of his own.

Sirius cocked an amused eyebrow, way up towards his hairline; he looked absolutely foolish.

Harry smiled a bit.

Sirius did too. He winked and then returned back to his now-cold tea.

That was another good thing about his godfather, Harry mused, as he resumed scratching his thumbnail down his butterbeer bottle: once all of the quarrelling, back-talking, scolding, and inevitable punishing was over, Sirius never spoke of it again.

Not much to hold a grudge over, really.

Dumbledore's teacup rattled against his saucer, causing Harry to shift his attention. His blue eyes crinkled round the edges.

"You've spoken to Remus, then," Sirius finally said; he was still fingering the end of his spoon, sliding it along the rim of his barely touched teacup; he pushed back a wavy strand of hair as he studied the headmaster through gray eyes dense as summer storm clouds.

So Sirius had broken the silence; Harry hadn't seen that one coming.

Dumbledore nodded once. "I have."

A large gulp of butterbeer suddenly lodged in Harry's throat. He forced it down through a painful swallow, wiping the back of his hand over his mouth.

Bloody hell.

"Miss Granger told me everything."

"Hermione?" Harry and Sirius piped up at nearly the same time. Harry pushed himself up straighter. "It wasn't her fault, really, Professor—"

Sirius held up a hand to silence Harry; he wore a mild frown as he pinned the headmaster with dark, questioning eyes. "You mean Remus told you everything," Sirius corrected.

Dumbledore lifted his chin slightly, his small spectacles flashing in the afternoon sunlight flooding in from the kitchen window.

"I think we can all agree it was a mistake," Sirius continued, his complexion a bit ruddy with discomfort, "one that won't happen again; Harry can promise you that." He glanced toward Harry, as though cueing him.

Shaking his head, Harry agreed. "No, sir, it won't." And then, surprising even himself, he gazed pleadingly at Dumbledore. "But can't you just punish me instead of Ron and Hermione? I was the one who brought the cloak..."

Sirius gave Harry a peculiar wince, a slight shake of his head.

Ducking his chin, Harry focused on the centimeter of butterbeer left in his bottle.

"I suppose if anyone _were_ to be solely responsible," Dumbledore said nonchalantly, tapping his fingertips together, steeple-like, "it would be good to remember who gave you the cloak in the first place…" His blue eyes shone with kindness.

Sirius, however, looked less than amused. A frown still furrowed his brows. "What is this about, Albus?"

"Hermione Granger was rather upset while in my office this afternoon," Dumbledore continued as though Sirius hadn't interjected. "She begged me several times to consider her offer to compose an essay as consequence for breaking the rules. She volunteered the same for Mr. Weasley …"

"What sort of essay?" Harry wondered, leaning forward, hands between his knees, pressing nervously into the edge of his seat.

Hermione loved writing essays. Harry did not. He hoped his own consequence from Sirius would be punishment enough.

"An essay on the necessity of rules," Dumbledore replied, a small smile tugging at his face. "Three rolls of parchment."

"_Three_ rolls?"

"She first suggested five…"

Harry gaped at Sirius in horror. Humility be damned—he'd report his walloping from the rooftops if it would save him from having to write such a long essay. Hermione killed him sometimes. She really did.

"I informed her, of course, that such penitence was hardly necessary," Dumbledore continued. "She does require her writing hand for Charms as well—best not injure it."

Harry's heart thudded merrily with relief.

Sirius had his elbow on the table now, his knuckles digging into his forehead as he stared at Dumbledore, attempting to make sense of the old man's demeanor. "So they're not writing essays, then."

"On the contrary, Miss Granger insisted," Dumbledore said pointedly, speaking to the tips of his fingers. "I couldn't seem to convince her otherwise. Mr. Weasley, however," he went on, his solemn eyes regaining their usual sparkle as he peeked over at Harry, "pleaded for manual labor."

Harry lowered his chin, smiling to himself.

Good old Ron.

"'Loads of it,' if I'm remembering correctly," the headmaster quoted.

Harry knew he could handle chores—he'd done them all his life with little complaint. But seeing as Harry wouldn't be going back to Hogwarts—judging by the irritated crookedness to Sirius' face as he continued to stare down Dumbledore—Harry doubted manual labor would be on his to-do list. Another relief.

Not that he'd got off particularly easy…

"However," Dumbledore replied thoughtfully, "if I know the three of you, you have already punished yourselves quite enough already. I only hope that Mr. Weasley has regained his natural complexion." Dumbledore tilted his head, along with his teacup, studying it, before sipping up the last dredges. "He was looking rather gray when he left my office…"

Slowly, Harry sat back in his chair, his feet hanging listlessly; his big toe, finding a stale cornflake under the table left over from breakfast, crushed it.

Sirius crossed his arms against his chest, an odd look—confusion maybe—washing over his face.

"They're not expelled, then?" Harry asked, before Sirius could open his mouth. He caught his godfather's eye, wondering if Sirius was thinking along the same lines. But Sirius only bit the inside of his lip: another checking-up look.

"They are not," Dumbledore replied. "Your friends were equally concerned over your fate…" He smiled warmly. "Such consideration is what bands you three together so strongly, I believe."

Harry slumped a bit in his chair. Fortunately for him, his particular _fate_ was something his friends wouldn't find out as far as he was concerned.

"You heard about Alastor?" Sirius pressed, combing his hair out of his eyes with impatient fingers. "Hermione was very worried about what she saw." He turned to Harry. "She wrote you a letter this morning, yeah?"

"Yeah…" Harry nodded; he straightened up again at being addressed. "She talked to me—" Harry flushed hot, catching himself just in time. Hermione might not have confessed about using the Floo network without permission, even if it had only been for a few seconds. "I mean, yeah, she wrote to me about him," he finished sheepishly.

_Idiot_, Harry berated himself as he obliterated another cornflake with his toe for good measure.

"It's what started all of this," Sirius informed, acting as though he hadn't noticed that Harry almost got his friend in deeper trouble. "But what I don't understand," he continued, his words a bit muffled as his fist was now pressed under his nose, "is why Hermione couldn't just go to you in the first place, Albus. Why was all this such a secret?" He was glancing between Harry and the headmaster now. "Caused more trouble than it was worth…"

"She said she had more to tell," Harry explained, "that she didn't want to write down." He didn't like talking about his friends when they weren't here. Made him feel like a snitch.

Maybe Sirius could tell, because he took his fist away from his mouth just then, lacing his fingers together instead, resting them on the table. He nodded at Harry. Nodded his understanding. "A letter's just not the same, is it?"

Before Harry could respond, Dumbledore cleared his throat, his gray brow vaulting over his spectacles. "It wasn't the mode of communication that troubled her, Sirius. It was the information."

"What information?" Harry wondered.

Dumbledore reached into his pocket, extracting a heavy pewter flask. He held it delicately in his palm, as though it were a flower petal. "Do you recognize this, Harry?"

Harry leaned forward. He recognized it immediately. "Yeah," he said, glancing at Sirius, who was perched forward just like Harry, squinting. "I mean, yes, sir. It's Professor Moody's, isn't it?"

"It is," Dumbledore affirmed.

"That's rather professional of him…"

At this, both Harry and Dumbledore glanced in Sirius' direction, but the headmaster ignored the statement, choosing instead to remove the lid from the flask; putting his nose close to the open container, he breathed in deeply. Keeping a close eye on Harry, he passed him the flask across the table.

Harry's brows sprang up in surprise; he spared a quick glance for Sirius, who continued to stare, his forehead considerably creased, and then slowly took the flask from Dumbledore's hand. He held it in a careful, two-handed grip. The flask was heavy. Cold.

Dumbledore lifted his chin. "I believe you will find the aroma recognizable as well."

Sirius sniffed lightly. "I should hope he doesn't…"

The humor quite lost on him, Harry gave Sirius a mildly incredulous look. "How would I know what whiskey smells like?"

"Contrary to what you may be thinking," Dumbledore interjected, cutting off Sirius' undoubtedly dry retort, "this flask does not contain any variation of such drink."

Frowning, Harry lifted the mouth of the flask to his nose and breathed deeply.

The container almost slipped from his fingers. His whole body flushed hot as the familiar odor of boiled cabbage invaded his nostrils. He gawked at Dumbledore, knowing, without having to look in a mirror, that the most bewildered, most horrified, and certainly most idiotic grimace was plastered all over his face.

"Where—" Harry croaked. Swallowing, he licked his lips, trying again, "Where did you get this?"

"What is it?" Sirius asked, his voice soft with concern. "Harry, what's wrong?"

The headmaster rested his arms on the table, looking straight through Harry. "Miss Granger found this in the corridor. Left, I believe," Dumbledore said, "by mistake."

"What in the world…" Sirius spoke breathily, shaking his head in confusion. "Albus?"

Harry couldn't take his eyes off of Dumbledore. The flask stuck to his sweaty palms. He handed it back to Dumbledore, wiping his hands on his trousers.

No wonder Hermione hadn't gone to Dumbledore straight off: she knew what was in that flask—just as Harry knew. And Ron, too. Only a person who had brewed such a complicated concoction—one that was illegal at Hogwarts—would recognize that smell.

Swallowing, Harry turned to Sirius.

"It's Polyjuice."

* * *

The barrage of clinking of forks against dinner plates had undergone a steady decrescendo over the past half hour. The only students left in the Great Hall, besides Hermione and Ron were a few scattered Hufflepuffs, two boys from Durmstrang, and Draco Malfoy, who was talking in shifty-eyed whispers with Theodore Nott over at the Slytherin table.

"I do blame you."

Hermione's face took on the color of an unripe watermelon. "Oh, you can't possibly be serious—would you _swallow your food_!"

Ron shoved in another forkful of mashed, buttered turnips and made a face. He waited until he'd chewed and swallowed before speaking again. "Look, Hermione, when you're called into the Head's office, you don't spew out every foul thing you've ever done—that's plain stupid."

Hermione was angry now; her mouth was pinched into a frown. "It's not as though you were much help," she said sourly, "you didn't say a word…just stood there and trembled, as though Dumbledore was going to hex you unconscious—oh, listen, why don't you?" Hermione snatched the fork out of Ron's hand, flinging bits of turnip along the table; she dropped the utensil onto a pile of dirty plates. A second later, the whole lot disappeared, including Ron's untouched pudding.

"Oy!" Ron exclaimed, clearly outraged. "I wasn't finished!"

"Stop being selfish, Ron," Hermione scolded. "Harry could be in loads of trouble, and all you care about is your appetite."

The deep line between Ron's ginger eyebrows slowly relaxed. He lowered his chin a bit, the offended ruddiness in his cheeks, easing around the edges. "You think Sirius was awful cross?" Ron wondered, peeking up in sympathy at the thought of his friend. "He doesn't shout like my mum, but I could tell he wasn't happy. He didn't even let us talk…just sent us back."

"He looked worried to me…"

Ron snorted his disagreement. "_Harry_ looked worried. He was in for it." Glancing over his shoulder at the summons of a familiar insult, Ron gave Draco Malfoy the finger as he passed by; the blond boy was snickering.

"Oh, I doubt that," Hermione muttered worriedly, tucking a flyaway strand of hair firmly behind her ear—twice.

Another soft snort. "I don't. You don't know Sirius, then."

Hermione rested her forehead against the heels of her hands, groaning. "This is all my fault."

Ron rolled his eyes a bit.

"Why didn't I just write to Sirius like I wanted to?" Hermione lamented. "We brewed that potion two years ago. He wouldn't have minded, would he?"

"You were thinking of Harry," Ron shrugged, "same as me."

Hermione sighed, deep and loud. "I suppose so. Not that it's done any good now…we're all in trouble."

"_You're_ in trouble," Ron corrected, eyeing Hermione as though she'd gone round the twist. "I didn't volunteer to write that bloody essay; you got _yourself_ in deep."

"We're lucky we weren't expelled, Ron!" Hermione argued, her hair slipping over her ear again. "Hogsmeade _and_ the Polyjuice!"

"Dumbledore's right fair, isn't he?" Ron said thoughtfully. "He didn't seem a bit angry."

"What if he's written to our parents?"

"He—" Ron faltered, his eyes flicking toward the windows as if a Howler were going to be delivered to him at any second. "He hasn't…"

"He might have—"

"Belt up a second," Ron interrupted, sliding his rear end forward on his bench. "Snape's staring at us again."

"Well, we're the only ones left in here, aren't we?" Hermione huffed, obviously still very chagrined that Ron had failed in sharing her panic.

"Oh, he's just looked away," Ron informed her quietly, spy-like. "He _was_ staring, though."

The flushed worry crept back into Hermione's face, blanching the slight sprinkle of freckles on her nose. "Do you think he knows?"

"About the Poly—"

"Shhh!" Hermione shushed him sharply. "Yes…"

Ron frowned. "Why would Dumbledore tell _him_?"

"They _were_ his ingredients."

"Dumbledore didn't even act like he cared about that." Ron kept his eyes on Professor Snape as he drained the last bit from his goblet, pushed his chair back swiftly, and left the staff table. Professor Sprout was the only teacher left. "Did he ever come to dinner?"

"Dumbledore?"

"Who else?"

"Well…" Hermione said loftily, "Professor Moody hasn't returned either."

Ron twisted his lips in uneasy thought, glancing back at the staff table unnecessarily. "You're sure that was his flask?"

Hermione rolled her eyes this time. "It fell out of his robes, Ronald…" She pushed herself up from the bench, waiting for Ron to do the same.

However, the boy simply gazed up at her, his eyes full of concern. "What if you're right, Hermione? What if he's after Harry for some reason?"

Considering this, Hermione sighed through her nose. "Dumbledore will do something. He's got to."

"I've got to see Harry…"

Another brief pause, and then, "Let's go," Hermione said briskly. "Come _on_."

Ron stood slowly. "Another brilliant plan, then?"

Hermione began walking ahead of him. "No."

"Then what…"

"I'm writing to Sirius."

Ron's eyes grew wide. "Hermione—"

"And this time, you can't stop me."

* * *

A handful of tea-stained spoons crashed against each other as they hit the bottom of the sink, causing Harry to flinch. Sirius jammed his lower back against the countertop; tossing his hair back, he sighed as he stared into a corner of the ceiling.

Harry still sat at the kitchen table, watching his godfather with wary eyes. He brushed a piece of fringe away from his spectacles and slid down a bit further in his seat, picking a nick in the side of the glossed wood. Harry's air of nonchalance was pathetically farced, but it was the best he had. What else do you do when your godfather's tossing cutlery around?

Or when Professor Dumbledore had just spent fifteen minutes outside tightening the wards, casting a fresh round of protection spells around the cabin in which Sirius and Harry had spent the last five months.

"You want a ham and cheese sandwich?" Sirius asked. The gentleness in his voice took Harry by surprise. "I can toast it if you'd like." He balanced his weight on the heels of his hands, looking expectantly at Harry. Sirius' brow was dotted with sweat.

"What's 'impetuous' mean?" Harry wondered, bypassing the issue of eating all together. "Foolish?"

Sirius gazed at him for a moment, and then his face relaxed. Not quite a smile. "No," he replied in the same calm tone. "More like 'reckless'."

Harry's stomach tingled in sudden defense. No wonder Sirius was put-out. "You're not reckless," Harry assured him. "Dumbledore shouldn't have said that."

"He didn't exactly," Sirius said, absently fussing with the dishtowel that lay over the edge of the sink.

Harry made an offended noise through his teeth. "'Sending even one person off scavenging for an elusive rodent is impetuous'," Harry quoted. "That's what Dumbledore said, didn't he?"

Sirius nodded, a bit of amusement playing about his tired face at the slight mocking in Harry's tone. "Impressive memory."

"You really think that was Peter Pettigrew impersonating Moody?" Harry asked. If so, Pettigrew was a class actor; in person, the bloke was a mealy twit: the exact opposite of Alastor Moody.

"What I think," Sirius said, raising both brows, "is that you should have your dinner." He tossed the dishtowel in Harry's direction; it landed on the table instead before slipping to the floor. "It's getting dark out." He turned toward the stove to heat it, poking his wand over his shoulder to summon a plate of butter, a package of sliced ham, and a block of Swiss cheese from the refrigerator.

Harry knew he should feel nervous. After all, someone was clearly after him. Why else would anyone come to Hogwarts, pretending to be Professor Moody? But a small voice inside his head reminded him that Sirius wouldn't let anyone harm him. Harry knew such thoughts were childish, but they made him feel good inside.

The blade of Sirius' knife clunked against the wooden cutting board as he sliced thick slabs of the white cheese.

"You think Dumbledore will cancel the Tournament?"

Sirius glanced over his shoulder as he continued to slice. "Most likely not…"

Harry considered this. "How come?"

Sirius pulled four slices of bread from the open bag sitting near the stove. "Well," he began, laying the pieces flat so he could butter them, "it would cause a bit of a stir, don't you think?"

"So?"

Soft flames whooshed underneath the metal pan with a flick of Sirius' wand.

"So," Sirius continued, "Dumbledore wants this kept quiet. He's tightened the security on the castle grounds."

Harry didn't understand. "But what if…" he shifted, sitting up straighter, "what if someone from Durmstrang is undercover? Karkaroff's a bit shady, don't you think?"

The sandwiches sizzled in the pan as Sirius flattened each one with his spatula. "I think Dumbledore is taking care of things the best way he knows how," Sirius said through a sigh. He lowered the heat on the stove and then padded, barefooted, over to the kitchen table, sliding into a chair.

Harry wetted his lips. "You think he should cancel the Tournament?" he ventured, a bit meekly, knowing very well that this point in the conversation between Dumbledore and Sirius had turned sour quite quickly. After that, they'd both gone outside, leaving Harry sitting the table, using every ounce of self-control he possessed to keep from listening through a cracked window.

Sirius shrugged. "Doesn't matter what I think…"

They sat quietly until the smell of smoky ham curling up from the stovetop drew Harry's attention away for just a second. "Hey, Sirius?"

"Hm?"

"You'll need to flip those."

"Damn..." Sirius' chair scraped the floor as he rushed to save the ham sandwiches from burning. He stayed by the stove until the food was ready and plated. He carried everything over to the table. "Sorry," he mumbled with a wince.

Harry wasn't sure if Sirius was apologizing for the swearword or the almost-burnt food—or both—but he gave his godfather a half-smile all the same.

Partway through the first half of his sandwich, Harry reached for a napkin. As he sat cleaning his hands, he figured now was as good a time as any to touch on the other sensitive subject, seeing as Sirius hadn't blown a fuse thus far. "Dumbledore wants us to come to Hogwarts, you know…"

Sirius paused, mid-chew.

Harry took a hasty bite, getting a mouthful of the crust, mostly.

Sirius took a long sip of his water, eyeing Harry over the rim of the glass.

A long, loud swallow. "I know."

Harry went for his milk, trying to judge his godfather's reaction over the edge of his own cup. "Should we?" The thought of joining his friends and returning to class was appealing, squaring things away with Ron, especially, not that Harry that staying here with Sirius was some horrible nightmare…

Sirius broke the second half of his sandwich into two smaller triangles. "You miss your friends, yeah?"

"No," Harry said with a shrug. "It's not that—it's only been two days—it's just…"

"I know," Sirius said, as though he could read Harry's mind.

They were all safer with Professor Dumbledore nearby. And they always would be.

Maybe that's what bothered Sirius the most.

"You need to be with your mates," Sirius continued. "And I'd be near if you need anything…"

"But where will you stay?" Harry was picturing a sixth bed in the Gryffindor dormitory, with Sirius' feet hanging off the end.

"I'm positive Snape's got a trundle underneath his bed," Sirius said, rather straight-faced.

Harry stared at him.

"In an empty quarters, nutter, where do you think?" Sirius rolled his eyes at Harry's serious expression. "The castle is very large; don't worry, I'd make myself scarce." He winked and took a sip of his water. "Unless you decide to brew an encore batch of Polyjuice…" Sirius spoke into his glass. He took another long drag of water, his eyebrows peaking over the rim.

Heat spread through Harry's cheeks like ink on a flannel.

Sirius swallowed, smiling a bit. "It's not as though we have to decide right this minute." He nodded toward Harry's plate. "Finish up."

Harry polished off the last half of his sandwich and most of his milk, thankful for the reprieve. Sirius was all right.

They were eating their way through the last few chocolate biscuits in the tin when a letter came through the Floo.

Harry waited in the kitchen, watching as Sirius read the letter to himself, the wrinkle in his forehead becoming more pronounced by the second.

"Is it from Dumbledore?" Harry asked. He bit into a broken biscuit.

"No," Sirius said slowly, still frowning as he reread the letter. "Remus."

"What'd he say?"

Sirius looked up. "Dumbledore's asked him to fill in as Defense Against the Dark Arts professor until they can find a replacement."

Harry dropped the remaining piece of biscuit back onto his plate. "But I thought everyone knew about—"

"They do." Sirius read the letter for a third time.

"Do you think he'll say yes?"

Sirius scratched the top of his head, squinting. "He already has."

TBC…

* * *

**Author's Note**: A special thanks to ObsidianEmbrace for helping me through my writer's block... and to Jogger for her faithful cheereleading and encouragement. Thanks to everyone who reviewed! I'll try my best to update as frequently as I can.


	8. Chapter Seven

**Chapter Seven**

"Oy! Slow it down a bit!"

Wind whooshed through Harry's ears, muffling most of Sirius' shout. The world was streaks of blue and green, but Harry was only focusing on one color: gold. The wings of the snitch fluttered so close to Harry's face he could hear their buzzing. He leaned in just a bit...

_Snatch_.

Harry looped around the tree standing at the edge of the garden and landed with a slight jog right in front of his godfather.

"Here," Harry panted, holding out the snitch; it droned unhappily in his fist, like a giant bumblebee. "Let's give it another go." The skin of Harry's cheeks was stiff from the constant blast of tepid wind against his face, but he felt wonderful and light. He let Sirius take the snitch from him, grinning at the expression on his godfather's face. "What?"

"Let's give you a tranquilizer first…"

"You're mental," he insisted, backing up a few steps and readjusting his hold on the Firebolt. "Can I go again, please?"

"You nearly took me out."

"I didn't either…" Harry grinned even wider. "You're slow."

Sirius feigned a reaction of pure outrage.

Harry dodged the poke aimed right for the soft middle of his stomach; he straddled his broom, hopping on one foot as he attempted to balance.

"Don't make me let loose a bludger…"

"You'd be pummeled."

Sirius gave an odd laugh; his eyes twinkled with mirth that Harry hadn't witnessed in a while. "Go on, you nutter," he said. "One more go, and then we're in for the night."

"But it's never this warm round November," Harry argued mildly. "It's our only chance…"

"Yes," Sirius agreed. "This is the end for your flying."

"I just mean—"

"We'd best bury your broomstick and hold a memorial."

Harry rolled his eyes. "Hilarious. Hey, Sirius?"

"Hey, Harry…"

Harry raised his eyebrows expectantly.

"Ready?" Sirius prompted, holding out the snitch; its wings danced in excitement.

Planting his feet, Harry squatted back on his broom. "Mmhm."

"One, two—"

Harry was off, the brisk wind plastering back his hair. In less than five minutes, Harry stumbled to a halt, his feet stinging in his trainers from the harsh landing, but his godfather's beaming face made Harry forget all about it.

He loved practicing Quidditch with Sirius.

"Once more, then." Harry remounted his Firebolt, only to slide it through his legs an instant later as Sirius opened his mouth to protest. He flashed a naughty half-grin at his godfather as he handed Sirius his Firebolt. "Only joking."

"You'll think _once more_," Sirius threatened slyly, his eyes sparkling, "when I hang you and your dear friend out the window and leave you dangling by its twigs." He choked up a bit on the broom handle and cocked his head toward the house. "In with you."

"I'm going…"

"Yes," Sirius agreed, giving Harry a good-natured nudge in the rear end with the blunt end of the stick as he trudged past, wiping the sweat off of his forehead with the edge of his sleeve. "Directly to the lav for a bath."

Harry swatted behind him to deter Sirius from his gentle jousting, but he kept moving; the long grass swished against his trainers; his godfather eventually fell in step beside him. He handed Harry his Firebolt.

"Can I tend to this first?" Harry asked as he lifted his t-shirt to clear away the fingerprints on the end of the gleaming handle. "We've only just eaten dinner, haven't we?"

"_Only_ two hours ago," Sirius said out of the side of his mouth, and then he grinned, a rare dimple deepening. "You've waited long enough, I reckon—I promise you won't cramp up and drown…"

Harry sniffed and rolled his eyes. "Good to know," he quipped. "I was worried."

"Thought so."

Reaching the door, they tramped inside the cool, dim-lit cabin, dragging the scent of crisp, brown leaves in with them. As he kicked off his trainers and reached down to collect them, Harry breathed in the aroma of autumn, mingled with the sweet, familiar smell of home. Leaving unpleasant thoughts of school in the backyard for the time being, Harry realized that he felt very nice today—calm and happy. He'd finished his take-home work early this afternoon and hadn't received a new parcel from one of the barn owls, which, by now, meant that none of his teachers had assigned homework.

It was a good Monday.

Thirty minutes later, Harry padded into his bedroom with wrinkled fingertips and slightly sore muscles from flying for so long. Since the other schools had arrived at Hogwarts, he hadn't been able to practice on the pitch as much as he wished he could.

Rubbing a towel through his wet hair, he sat on the edge of his bed so he could clean the few drops of water still clinging to his glasses. He was sliding them back onto his face when a tapping sounded at his window.

Harry stared at his reflection in the otherwise dark window; the soft glow from the lantern created a glare on the pane, but Harry didn't need to see _out_ of the window to identify the familiar hooting and feathery whisper of wings. Tossing his towel onto the bed, Harry hurried over to the window and opened it.

"You're a bit early tonight, Hedwig."

The snowy owl blinked at him. She had spent the past two days flying from dawn until dark and usually didn't tap on his window until right before ten o'clock.

Harry smiled as she flapped her way in and perched on the edge of the bookshelf; two thick scrolls of parchment dangled from her leg.

"I've got a letter?" Harry remarked as he untied the scrolls, leaving one to rest next to Hedwig's foot while he unfurled the other against his thigh. "Oh, it's for Sirius." Without another glance, Harry let the parchment curl up again. "Did you pick this up in Hogsmeade?"

Hedwig hooted softly.

Harry called for his godfather. Twice.

Footsteps sounded on the staircase. "What's that now?" Sirius' voice drifted in from the top landing.

Harry absently stroked Hedwig's downy head as she preened underneath her wings. "You've got a letter, I said."

"From whom?"

"Dunno," Harry said. "I didn't read it."

"Bring it here, will you?"

Sirius was standing with one foot on the landing and the other resting further down the staircase; he leaned against the very edge of the banister.

"I was just about to come say goodnight—figured you were knackered out." Brushing a strand of hair back from his face, Sirius gestured with his chin when Harry held out the scroll; he smiled his thanks but didn't read it just yet. "Oy," Sirius said, as though he'd suddenly remembered something, and then, descending briskly, he glanced over his shoulder, "Follow me down."

Harry made a face, his achy muscles protesting at the thought of straining back up the stairs. "What'd you forget?"

"Come on, then," Sirius exclaimed, having reached the bottom landing now. "I'm old and lame; do me a favor."

"You're not lame…"

"Ah." Sirius lifted his chin. "Just old?"

Harry dug his big toe into the plush rug, pulling a face that clearly informed his godfather just how barmy Harry thought he was.

Sirius flashed him a second quick grin; he jerked his head in the direction of the kitchen. "Move your bum." His mock urgency was becoming comical.

Sighing, Harry plodded down the stairs. He used his fingers to comb down his damp fringe as he followed Sirius through the kitchen.

Upon reaching the sitting room, Harry's eyebrows climbed up his forehead in genuine surprise.

There on the sofa sat Ron, his long legs stretched out in front of him; his face immediately split with a wide grin. "You're not going to bed _now_, are you?"

Harry studied his plaid pajama bottoms and bare feet; he knew his cheeks were still pink from the bath, and he certainly _felt_ as though he could fall into bed and sleep until morning, but he ignored all that, choosing, instead, to settle on the arm of the sofa, still gawking at his best mate with a mixture of confusion and elation.

The armchair squeaked as Sirius fell onto its cushion, using one hand to flatten the curl out of his letter before he held it under his nose. He winked at them from over the parchment and then settled back to read.

"How come you're here?" Harry wanted to know.

Ron shrugged, still grinning slightly. "I asked McGonagall if I could come see you for a bit before curfew, and she said yes," he explained. He cast a flicker of a glance in Sirius' direction, but Sirius appeared to be engrossed in his reading. "She said I should bring you this." Ron reached into his back pocket and pulled out a familiar-looking piece of pale-rose parchment—folded into fourths. Harry would have recognized that stationary anywhere: it was from Professor McGonagall's personal desk set.

Harry took the parchment from Ron with miserable reluctance. "Thanks…"

"I've got the same homework as well, you know," Ron said.

"Not a whole week's worth." Harry kept the note folded, not wishing quite yet to muddle his nearly-perfect Monday.

"Fair enough," Ron admitted. He brushed a shock of ginger hair from his forehead and turned his eyes on Sirius, watching him. "We had a silent study period during Defense Against the Dark Arts today—in the Great Hall," Ron informed them. "Snape had to oversee part of it—" He pulled an offended face. "—Flitwick took the second half. Neither of them would tell us anything about Moody, but at least Professor Flitwick let us work in pairs as long as we whispered. You couldn't even cough around Snape without him leaping down your throat."

Sirius had looked up from his letter. "I doubt you'll have Silent Study after tomorrow," Sirius said kindly, his eyes soft with sympathy as he folded the parchment in half and laid it on the table next to his chair. "I don't think so, anyway…"

"Is that when Remus will start?" Harry piped up, staring at his godfather now, as well. "On Wednesday?"

"Professor Lupin?" Ron sat up eagerly. "He's coming back?"

Sirius bit his lip. Almost a flinch. "Most likely," he admitted. "But—"

Ron let out a whoop, but Harry only squinted in apology, realizing that he'd spilled that news a bit too soon. "Sorry…"

Sirius' face relaxed as his mouth twisted into a weak smile. "It's not permanent until it's all sealed with Dumbledore, so let's keep it quiet until then, all right?"

Ron glanced at Harry and nodded. "We won't say anything, will we, Harry?"

"Oh, sure," Harry said sarcastically, feeling like a dolt, for starters; but mostly, he felt separated from the goings-on at school—disconnected—even though there was a good chance that he and Ron would be sharing a desk in Defense Against the Dark Arts in two days, seeing as Remus would be there to oversee them. But all the same, a wave of melancholy washed over him, and Harry didn't quite understand it.

"Fred and George told me that Dumbledore had Filch seal up all of the…erm…" Ron trailed off, his ears pinking up rapidly. "I mean—"

"He already knows where all of the secret passages are," Harry said, indicating Sirius with a twitch of his shoulder. "He's the one who asked Dumbledore to seal them."

Ron's forehead and cheeks were still splotched with ruddy patches, but his embarrassment seemed to have faded as quickly as it had come, as Sirius had barely reacted, save for lacing his fingers together. Harry knew that Mrs. Weasley would have used this moment as an ample opportunity to remind (and rebuke) the lot of them for knowing about a secret passage at all.

If she was even aware in the first place…

"Does Harry get to come back, then?"

Harry, who slid off the arm of the sofa once it began creaking (and Sirius began nudging Harry's backside with an encouraging toe), was the first to answer, "Yeah," he said with a shrug. "We're both going back, aren't we?"

Sirius raised his eyebrows at being addressed and drew in a breath; his lips twitched as if he were considering his next words. "Well…"

"Dumbledore wants him to," Harry answered for him.

"Brilliant!" Ron said; his freckles smudged together as he beamed. Harry knew how much Ron admired Sirius, and the news of his coming to Hogwarts probably ranked up top with Viktor Krum's arrival. "Stay in Gryffindor," the boy suggested, sitting on the edge of his cushion now. "McGonagall's been a bloody toad lately—"

Harry laughed out loud, though he quite liked Professor McGonagall; she was stern, yes, but fair.

Ron, on the other hand, was comical—Harry couldn't help but chuckle.

Even Sirius smiled a bit. "Nothing's definite," he said, speaking with the same, safe ambiguity that he had earlier. "I've got to think on it."

"What's to think about?" Harry wondered; he rested forearm on his kneecap, brows furrowed in curiosity.

"Loads," Sirius said with a straight face. "My account at Gringott's…world peace…whether Germany will replace their Seeker with that bloke from Iceland…"

"He's joking, Ron."

"I know that," Ron insisted defensively.

"Come on, Sirius," Harry tried again. "What's to consider?"

"Well," Sirius began, leaning forward slightly, "your safety, for one thing."

Harry flicked his eyes in Ron's direction, but his friend was listening with intent, chewing pensively at his bottom lip.

"Whether or not Alastor Moody returns is another," Sirius added.

"If he does return," Ron cut in," what does that mean?"

Sirius shook his head. "I don't know," he said honestly. Harry could tell by the uneasy way Sirius twisted his thumbs together that his godfather _wished_ he knew. "I don't like feeling this uncertain about it."

"But don't you think Dumbledore would have already sent everyone home if he thought we were unsafe?"

"If he strongly suspected it, yes," Sirius answered Ron's second question.

"The lot of us had to sleep in the Great Hall last year when...er…" Ron's ears glowed. Again.

"He knows," Harry said, trying not to laugh. "Sirius wasn't trying to kill me then, though."

"Amazing how things have changed," his godfather remarked; he winked at Harry. "Strange days, weren't they?"

Ron glanced between Harry and Sirius like he always did, as though he wasn't sure what to make of their silly exchanges.

"I need another night to sleep on it," Sirius told them. "Speaking of which..." He reached for his letter, folded it even smaller, and tucked it into the front pocket of his trousers. "Harry's got an hour before he nods off. " Sirius pushed himself out of his chair and stretched. "Go visit up in his room for a bit. I'm going to have a sandwich."

"We already ate…"

"All that coaching you made me do took it out of me," Sirius said, ruffling Harry's wet hair as he sauntered his way into the kitchen. "I'm famished."

Harry stood as well, attempting to comb his fringe back into place. "C'mon, then," he said to Ron, "we can have a go at Chess."

"You'll only lose…"

"That's because you cheat."

"Oy!" Ron's voice squeaked. "I don't either. Percy cheats—he calls it strategizing."

* * *

Harry sneezed. Tiny specks of Dust eddied about the bright moonlight pouring in from the windows in Sirius' new bedchamber (which turned out to be in Gryffindor Tower after all, concealed behind the tapestry of Barnaby the Barmy) as Harry threw open the last set of thick, red curtains. Sniffing deeply, Harry wiped his nose on the back of his wrist and glanced around the room.

"It's not bad," Harry remarked to his godfather, who was still rummaging in his trunk for his pajamas and the dressing gown he never wore. Harry had been tempted to take the mickey out of Sirius for packing that, but as his godfather seemed a bit jittery, Harry had refrained.

That was Tuesday night.

Now it was Wednesday morning before breakfast; Harry was quite certain that even Filch hadn't woken yet to patrol the grounds, seeing as it was barely half past five.

Sirius pulled out a pair of wrinkled tan trousers, made a face at them, and tossed them, still partly folded, onto the canopied bed.

Harry watched him; wrinkled his nose. "You think it's bad?"

"Hm?" Sirius said, flipping his head over his shoulder. "Oh, no…quite the opposite, actually."

"Then how come you're not talking?"

"Sorry…" Sirius said, frowning down into his trunk. "It's not on purpose. I can't think this morning." He tapped the heel of his hand against his forehead as his eyes continued scanning his loot.

The bedsprings squeaked as Harry plopped down on the mattress. "You're probably half asleep; you forgot to make coffee."

"I know—if my head suddenly drops off and rolls under the bed, be sure to catch it…"

"You're losing it, Sirius."

He snapped his trunk shut and blew out his breath; he smiled a bit as his eyes came to rest on Harry. "What? Am I headless?"

"How come you're so nervous?" Harry wondered. "It's just Hogwarts."

Sirius sniffed out a small chuckle. "You'd think_ I_ was coming back to teach you lot today instead of Remus—I'll bet he's calm as ever."

"I'll be Snape's not…" Harry said, absently fingering the cuff of the pair of trousers that lay on Sirius' bed—another item of clothing Harry hadn't seen Sirius wear. Ever. "You think everyone will treat him the same?"

"What?" Sirius stood from his crouched position. "Like dirt? It'd only be fair…"

"No, not Snape," Harry said, his eyes trained on the poker that was magically kindling the fire that crackled in the hearth. "Remus."

"Ah." Sirius nodded as he took a seat on his trunk. He folded his trousers over his arm. "These are hideous. If I ever try to wear these, you have permission to Stun me."

Harry tried to smile, but his mind had drifted back to a memory of Remus standing in his office with his trunk on the last day of school, collected, as usual, but resigned. Used to it all.

But somehow… not.

"People can be more tolerant than we think," Sirius said, giving Harry's forearm a comforting squeeze.

Having kicked off his trainers, Harry sat cross-legged on the bed now, waiting for Sirius to say something more, but he didn't. "Remus said that if the parents knew that he was a werewolf, they'd go mental. Snape told everyone at breakfast. Even Fudge would have to know."

"Dumbledore took care of it," Sirius assured him. "Besides, if Remus thought he'd be run out of the school, he wouldn't put himself through that. You didn't hear any of your mates complaining about wanting him gone, did you?"

Harry hadn't thought of that. Remus' exit was a very quiet one. "No," Harry said, "We were all angry that he was leaving—well, except Malfoy, but he doesn't like anyone except Snape…"

"There you are, then." Sirius nudged Harry's knee. "You should go back to sleep—you've got three hours 'til breakfast. The sun isn't even up yet."

Harry shrugged.

"Go on," Sirius urged. "Your bed will be nice and comfy."

Harry hung his feet over the edge of Sirius' mattress, but he hesitated.

"Hey, now," his godfather said gently. "Ron's forgotten all about the row you had; he won't give you any grief."

"It's not that," Harry tried to explain. "It's just…" He peeked up with searching eyes. "You think they'll act strange? I mean, First Years still stare at me in the corridors sometimes—I don't care about that—but it's different when it's…you know…"

"People you trust?"

Harry watched as the poker slipped back onto its hook. He looked at Sirius; he nodded.

Reaching over, Sirius brushed Harry's fringe off to the side. "They'll be all right," he promised.

Harry shifted. "But what am I supposed to say?"

It was Sirius' turn to shrug. "Tell them you flew to China and back—at least the little ones will be believe you."

Harry gave him a look. Sirius winked. "Come on," he said with a nod toward the plumpest goose down pillow. "You can sleep in here if you want; I'll just read a bit."

"I'm not that tired, actually," Harry said; he traced the curly patterns on the quilt with his fingertip. "I think the Floo shook it out me…"

"You're getting much better at landing," Sirius assured him with a chuckle.

"You're lying—I'm complete pants."

Chuckling again, Sirius rubbed the back of his neck.

"You need coffee," Harry observed.

His godfather gave Harry a weary smile. "I know. I think I know where to get some."

"Where?"

Sirius studied him. "If you fall asleep in Binns' class this morning, don't say I didn't warn you…" He stood, pulling a thin jumper over his head.

"Professor Binns wouldn't notice anyway," Harry explained. "I don't even think he knows we're there. Hermione has to elbow Ron in the stomach to keep him from dozing."

"Well, jump back into your trainers, then."

Harry did just that. "Do I need my jacket?"

"We're not jogging 'round the castle…"

"We could," Harry joked. "That would wake you up."

"Here—the corridors are drafty."

Harry got a face-full of cotton as his hoodie flew towards him from the hall-tree in the corner. He pulled it over his head; it smelled of home. As Harry crouched down to tie his trainers, he gazed after Sirius as his godfather moved around the room, turning down the lanterns mounted on the wall. Sirius was sacrificing a great deal for Harry: his freedom, his privacy, his pride…

This time, however, Sirius was preserving something that meant more to Harry than all of those things: his safety. And for the first time in a long while, Harry's nerves uncoiled.

"Where are we going? The Great Hall?" Harry asked as he double-knotted his trainer and stood up; he rolled his sleeves up at the wrists, as usual, and shoved them up to his elbows.

Sirius led them out into the shadowy corridor; the tapestry whooshed closed behind them. "You'll see," he muttered.

Every noise seemed to echo in the vast, silent castle: their footsteps, their swishing trousers, their yawns. Harry stuffed his hands into his pockets as they waited on the fourth floor landing for the staircase to swivel round their way. Stone grinded on stone, causing Harry to glance around, but, still, no one was anywhere to be seen. Snores and whistles came from the dark portraits.

Sirius grinned at Harry through a yawn, his hands finding his own pockets.

A few minutes later, they had successfully made it to the main floor of the castle.

"See, I was right," Harry commented as they each heaved open a door leading to the Great Hall. The mock sky seemed swollen with purple and rose-colored clouds; the candles floated overhead, their flames flickering as always. "The tables aren't out yet…"

"One is," Sirius said, pointing toward the staff table, where three tall silver pots sat in the very middle, surrounded by clay mugs and teacups. "Dumbledore and his early-morning carafe service," he continued. "Never fails."

When they had made their way over, Harry stepped up onto the platform and peeked inside all three. Coffee and tea. "This is for teachers, isn't it?"

Sirius stepped up next to Harry. "And for whoever is up this early, I suppose."

"How'd you know about the coffee?"

Filling one of the heavy mugs to the brim, Sirius smiled to himself. "I was an early riser."

"A nocturnal prowler is more accurate."

Harry jumped at the sound of a third voice in the room. Sirius whipped around, his coffee sloshing onto the staff table.

They stared at Snape, who gazed over their shoulders with eyes of stone. "Get out of my way."

It was a quiet command. Gray. Emotionless.

Sirius tugged on Harry's sleeve, and they stepped aside, allowing Snape to pour himself a cup of coffee. He cleared Sirius' mess with an irritated flick of his wand.

Keeping his eyes on Snape, Sirius only stood there, blinking, loosely clutching the bunch of Harry's shirtsleeve. Harry waited for his godfather to tell off Snape, but he didn't. Not a word.

The whisper of Snape's robes flowing behind him grew quieter until he slipped through the door and left them in silence.

"It's Remus," Harry said, once Snape was completely out of sight. "He hates that he's teaching it again."

Harry knew, as well as Sirius, that he needn't identify what _it_ was.

"He's the world's biggest git."

Silently, Sirius refilled his mug. And then he filled another one, this time only half-way with the steaming coffee, adding cream up to the top with a couple spoonfuls of sugar. "Your first and last," Sirius said as he carefully handed Harry his mug. He took a long sip of his own black coffee and twisted his lips into a smirk. "At least for a while."

"Thanks." Harry sipped his coffee just like Sirius had. He liked it.

Sirius sighed; tossed his hair back with his fingers. "We should rethink that jog."

"Let's walk down to the lake," Harry suggested. "Dumbledore lets everyone from Durmstrang sleep out there, so I'm guessing it's all right…"

Sniffing in amusement, Sirius lifted Harry's hood over his head and gave his hair a good mussing. "I'm sure you're right."

"I am," Harry assured him, tossing back his hood and attempting to tame his hair into less of a bird's nest.

"You lead the way, then," Sirius said, stepping off of the platform. "Don't spill your coffee."

Harry gave him a lopsided grin. "I won't; I've got better balance than you, remember?"

"In every way."

TBC…

* * *

**Author's Note: So excited to be writing this story again! Thanks so much for reading and for the reviews for last chapter :-) Lots going on at Hogwarts, so stick around! The next chapter of Mindful Eyes is on deck if you're following that one.**


	9. Chapter Eight

**Author's Note: A quick recap - Professor Moody has left Hogwarts without word, Dumbledore has asked Sirius to take Harry back to Hogwarts and has invited him along, and now, Harry is ready for his first day back. If you've stuck with me for this long, bless you :-) An long chapter for you; hope you enjoy!**

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* * *

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**Chapter Eight**

Harry was used to people gawking at him. Over the past several years at Hogwarts, he'd learned to ignore the stares; he didn't even train his eyes on the floor anymore and pretend to kick at stones, like he had found himself doing when he was eleven.

As he wandered into the Great Hall for breakfast, however, his neck prickled with an uncomfortable heat that only got worse when he sat down with Ron and Hermione and poured himself a bowl of Wheatie Wizards, sprinkling too much sugar over the brown squares; a splash of milk flicked his glasses.

"They can keep eating, you know," Harry said around a mouthful of too-sweet cereal he barely tasted. "I haven't grown two heads." He pretended to be moderately interested in an animated cartoon on the back of the box, but at the moment he felt as vulnerable as he did in those nightmares where he ran around Hogwarts in his pants, because someone had stolen his robes.

He could feel his friends' eyes meeting over his head.

Ron stuffed a forkful of eggs in his mouth. "All right, mate?"

"Oh, I'm so glad you're back, Harry," Hermione said softly. "It's been odd in class without you." She was smiling, but her eyes shone with worry.

"Thanks loads, Hermione," Ron slurred as he chewed his eggs.

"Everything isn't about _you_, Ron."

"She can't ever take a joke," Ron explained, as if Hermione weren't sitting right next to him. He ignored her pinched glower and snapped off a bit of bacon with his teeth, giving Harry a chewing grin. "Sirius is really here?"

Harry nodded into his goblet of pumpkin juice.

"Why didn't he come to breakfast?" Ron prodded. Having already spoken with Sirius, he appeared considerably more comfortable than Hermione, who had abandoned her breakfast to nibble on a fingernail.

"He's asleep," Harry lied, knowing full-well that once Sirius had had his coffee, he was up for the day. He didn't feel like explaining Sirius' hesitancy in gallivanting around Hogwarts like another one of the staff. "He'll probably eat later."

"Professor Moody isn't back," Hermione told them, stealing quick glances at the staff table; the spot reserved for the Defense teacher remained empty. "Ron told me about Professor Lupin."

Harry and Ron exchanged glances—Ron twisted his mouth, his ginger eyebrows drawing together.

"I hope he starts today," Hermione said excitedly. "He's the best Defense teacher we've ever had; I was so disappointed when he…what?"

"She made me tell!"

"I didn't say anything," Harry countered, his own eyebrows flying up into his fringe.

"Oh, Harry, you know I can tell when the two of you are trying to keep something quiet," Hermione said. "You're not very good at it, are you?"

Harry sniffed. "Ron sure isn't…"

"Oy!"

"It's fine." Harry waved it away, spooning up another mouthful of cereal. He swallowed. "Yeah, he agreed to come back and teach; I'm not sure when he'll start, though."

"It'd better be today," Ron said sourly. "One more study hour with Snape breathing down my neck, and I'm skiving off. You can come too, Harry. I'll have a fainting spell, and you can get a nosebleed."

"Quick thinking, Ron," Hermione scoffed. "Very original."

"Hermione, you can have the tr—"

"_Don't_ say it," Hermione interrupted pointedly. "I know _exactly_ where you're going with this. Don't be tactless."

"What was I going to say, then?" Ron chuckled; he coughed hoarsely, pulling a piece of bacon down the wrong way, but he was still grinning, red-faced and all.

Hermione rolled her eyes and reached for a triangle of buttered toast.

Harry went back to "reading" the cereal box.

The Great Hall was beginning to get noisier as students strolled in, alternately laughing with their friends and yawning as they sat in their usual seats. Harry kept one eye on Cedric Diggory—the Hogwarts Champion—as he strolled through the double doors, his gaggle of admirers falling in step behind him. A seventh-year Hufflepuff, nearly two heads taller than Harry, clapped Cedric on the shoulder and jostled him. A wavy-haired girl near the back of the group caught Harry's eye; she nudged her friend and pointed.

Harry ducked his head, the flush returning more quickly than before. His latest mouthful of cereal felt like jagged glass going down.

"Harry?"

"Huh?"

Hermione and Ron were staring at him. "Do you want to or not?" Ron piped up.

Harry scratched at a phantom itch beneath the shoulder of his robes. "Do I want to what?"

"Go see Sirius before History of Magic," Hermione answered for him. "Will he be awake, do you think?"

"Erm," Harry began, his brain still rather foggy, "I dunno… I mean, I guess we…" He trailed off, a collective snort from the Hufflepuff table drawing away his attention once more. The same group of seventh-years was eyeing Harry and laughing. Cedric was sort of half-grinning, but he reached across the table shortly after and had one of his friends hand him a platter of toast, leaving only a couple of Hufflepuffs chortling in Harry's direction.

Harry felt his face go even redder than before.

"Ignore them, Harry," Hermione insisted. "They've been acting beastly ever since Cedric's name came out of the Goblet of Fire. You'd think he won the Olympics."

"The what?" Ron mumbled through a crumpet this time, both cheeks bulging.

"Muggle thing," Harry and Hermione said together.

"Oh." Ron tried to swallow; he ended up reaching for his juice.

"I don't care," Harry fibbed, knowing his face was still glowing. "Yeah, let's get out of here."

Ron pocketed a buttered crumpet as Harry and Hermione stood from the table; Harry heard him jogging to catch up.

As they passed by the staff table, Snape spared Harry a flicker of a glance, his eyes black and disdainful, before sticking his nose into his goblet. Harry stuffed his hands into the pockets of his robes and kept walking.

Someone bumped into his shoulder –hard—as Harry reached the exit. Harry jerked his head up, glaring straight into a pair of beady eyes that seemed to be suffocating in a head as large as a side of beef.

Draco Malfoy smirked from where he stood between his cronies, Crabbe and Goyle. "Do watch where you're going, Potter," Malfoy sniggered. "No wonder they kicked you out of the Tournament."

"Piss off," Ron muttered, his eyes stormy, his fists already clenching. Harry was always amazed how quickly Ron's mood could slide from elated to enraged, trombone-style.

Malfoy laughed again as he made his way over to the Slytherin table.

Harry stared after them; his palms had begun sweating in his pockets.

"Forget it," Hermione said. "Malfoy's pathetic."

"Come on," Harry mumbled, wishing his sullen tone didn't give him away so immediately. He kept his head down as he plodded toward the staircase. "He'll be awake."

Hermione and Ron followed him, but none of them spoke until they reached Gryffindor Tower.

"There's actually a room behind this old bloke?" Ron exclaimed, tapping a knuckle on Barnaby the Barmy's face once they had reached the end of the corridor. "I just thought Dumbledore had him hung where no one could see his dusty mug—"

"Harumph!" The tapestry quivered, sending a puff of dust into Ron's startled face; he blinked, stumbling back on his heels.

"Sorry," Ron mumbled. Barnaby said nothing in response, choosing to frolic around his tapestry instead, hopping about on one foot and bashing at the air with an invisible sword, his white hair bouncing.

Hermione rolled her eyes.

"What?" Ron whispered defensively. "I didn't know he could speak; he usually just stares at you, all dodgy and bug-eyed…"

Harry brushed past the both of them. Holding the tapestry aside, he muttered the password: "Silly string."

When the panel in the wall creaked open, Harry climbed through to stand in the short corridor that led to Sirius' new quarters. Ruby and violet lanterns sparkled on the stone walls and continued up to the tip-top of the vaulted ceilings.

"Wicked," Ron breathed, craning his neck.

"Harry, is that you?" Sirius' voice drifted from the other side of the room, followed by the sound of a chair scraping against the floor.

A second scraping noise.

"How'd you know?" Harry asked as he perched on Sirius' bed, keeping his trainers off the mattress. "Hi, Remus," he greeted, once he caught sight of the bundle of washed-out robes sitting at the small breakfast table near the window.

Sirius winked. "I know your feet," he said, in response to Harry's question. "How they sound."

Harry nodded distractedly.

Remus gave a half-wave that dutifully matched his half-smile.

"It's true, then?" Ron piped up, bouncing down on the bed in front of Harry.

Hermione remained at the headboard, tilting her head in exasperation at Ron's second display of tactlessness. "Hello, Professor." Her comment was for Remus but her eyes were for Ron only.

"How are you, Hermione?" Remus said as he dusted crumpet crumbs from his lap and stood slowly, giving his spine a stretch. "Ron?"

"Brilliant." Ron grinned.

Hermione carried on a short conversation with Remus about what they had learned so far with Professor Moody, with Ron interjecting every so often, only to have Hermione correct him seconds later.

"That's what I just said, isn't it?" Ron twisted around, frowning at Hermione.

"You made it sound as though he used the Unforgivables on a student, Ron—"

"Didn't either…"

"Might as well have, though," Hermione said under her breath; Harry recognized the air of disapproval in her voice. "He's clearly mental."

Harry wondered if either of them realized that they were speaking to the same man who'd snitched on them to Dumbledore only a few days ago. Either way, Harry acted as though he knew nothing. No sense in having Ron get upset again and blame Harry for something else. Falling in disgrace with the grown-ups was one thing, but receiving the silent treatment from his best mate belonged in its own rotten category.

Harry noticed Sirius in his peripheral vision, studying him—only a second—and then he turned to Ron. "When have you got this bloke?" he gestured toward Remus with a twitch of his head. He tried a soft smile on Harry that received a late reception. By the time Harry realized he hadn't smiled back, Ron was talking again.

"Tomorrow after lunch," Ron replied, leaning onto his elbow. "You're back for good, then?" he tried once more.

Remus considered Ron warmly. "We'll see."

"If Dumbledore asked the both of you here, he had a reason to, didn't he?" Hermione asked; she was picking at the pleats in her skirt, the way she did when she was worried or just thinking. "He must think something's off here…"

"He's humoring me," Sirius said gently before switching over to the adult voice he reserved for all of them. "It's nothing to fret over; I'll let you know if the time comes. Oy—nearly nine o'clock, you three. Cutting it close…" He offered Ron a hand before hoisting him off the bed. Harry stood with them.

"We just came to say hello," Hermione said, readjusting the shoulder strap of her satchel; she tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and smiled. "I'm glad you're here, Professor," she added shyly. "You, too, Sirius." She turned. "Come on, Harry."

Harry made to slide to the edge of the bed, but Sirius held up a finger.

Remus polished off the last off the coffee in his tumbler and stood. "I'll walk with you," he said to Hermione. "I've got First Years in about an hour."

Ron snorted, adjusted his own satchel, and shuffled toward the jewel-lit foyer. "Best of luck. Dennis Creevy is barmy."

"Harry'll be along in a minute," Sirius called after them.

Harry sat back against the headboard, nudging up his glasses as he peeked up at his godfather. Sirius finished banishing the breakfast dishes. Brushing aside his fringe, Harry let a sigh escape that was entirely too loud. He picked at a button on the comforter.

The mattress dipped as Sirius sat at the foot of his own bed. He rested his hand on Harry's shin. "Was I wrong?"

"About what?" More picking.

"Did they act like gits?" Sirius asked through a squint. "Your mates?"

Harry didn't feel like talking about the scene in the entrance way of the Great Hall, but he didn't feel like eluding Sirius' questions either, which would only mean being late to class, which, in turn, would mean more stares, more sniggers, and, judging by the way Harry was feeling, Malfoy's two front teeth falling to the floor by way of Harry's fist.

"They're all right," Harry admitted. "And Malfoy always acts like a toss—" Harry swallowed away the word. "—a prat," he amended. "I'm used to it."

"Jealousy makes people act that way…"

Harry stopped picking; he glanced up. "Jealous of what?" he challenged. "Of being pulled out of the Tournament?"

Sirius pinched his bottom lip between his fingers the way he did when he was considering whether to suggest that Harry cool down or change the subject altogether. Rarely did Sirius choose the latter.

Except for this morning.

Sirius threaded his fingers together, rested them on his lap and waited.

Grateful for the silent reprieve, Harry kept his sulking in check.

"Not likely," Harry mumbled. "He probably couldn't wait to tell everyone that I'd been kicked out for being too runty—or stupid—" Harry frowned at the loose thread he held in his fingers and watched it float to the floor. "Or, I dunno, wetting my pants in front of the Minister or some other rot."

Sirius was struggling not to smile. "You know that's not the case," he consoled. "Ron and Hermione know that. Dumbledore—"

"Dumbledore knows it, and McGonagall…and Remus…" Harry trailed off, sighing again. "Yeah, I know."

"And _I _know it." Sirius dipped his chin, catching Harry's eye. "Just let Malfoy be sore for a while. He'll tire of it."

"He never does."

"Well," Sirius began, pinching his bottom lip again. "I suppose he _is_ a prat, then." He smiled behind his fingers.

Harry tried to do the same, but his face couldn't quite make the effort. Humiliation, regardless of its cause, was difficult to shake. "Are you going to stay in here all day?" Harry asked, wanting to change the subject.

"Thought I might test out your Firebolt," Sirius said slyly. "You know, for Quidditch safety. I'm a natural, you said."

"I said the opposite, actually." A glimpse of a grin this time. "But they canceled all Quidditch until the Tournament's over, remember?"

"No wonder you're glum…"

"Haven't thought about it until now," Harry said honestly. "Really, though, you're not supposed to stay holed up here until Dumbledore figures out who put my name in the Goblet, are you? That'd be mental."

"Don't you worry about me." Sirius' eyebrows stretched high and his eyes turned solemn. But only until one of the solemn eyes winked—a feat only his godfather could manage. "That rule's non-negotiable."

"I know," Harry said, sliding off of the bed as the bell tower gonged the five-minute warning. "Just curious." He untangled his satchel strap from his shoulder and readjusted it more comfortably.

"Hey." Sirius stood with him. He took Harry by the shoulders and squeezed them gently. "Keep your head up, Bub. Do you hear me?"

Harry let one last sigh escape—a quiet one. An agreement sigh. He nodded.

So did Sirius.

"All right, then." Sirius smiled with his eyes. "Off with you."

Harry turned.

"I'm afraid I don't count as much of an excuse for being tardy." Sirius' voice trailed Harry to the tapestry. "Professor Binns never cared for me."

"He's dead," Harry murmured. "He doesn't care for anyone."

"Unfortunate, yet true."

Harry spared one last smile over his shoulder before he let the tapestry fall behind him.

* * *

Harry was as good as his word. Almost. He was able to keep his head up most of the time, which, really, meant ignoring Malfoy and Cedric and most of the other Hufflepuffs as best as he could. Their laughing died down rather quickly once they realized Harry was only planning on finishing his stewed roast and potatoes at lunch rather than firing back insults.

At least, that's what it looked like.

Ron wasn't fairing as well, however. More than once, his freckles would pale as his face flushed in anger, but like a mother tending to a worsening fever, Hermione quelled Ron's temper with a pointed look and a few words of encouragement.

"They're idiots, Ron," Hermione said quickly, as she attempted to swallow her mouthful of buttered dinner roll. "If you act as though you care, it'll only make things worse."

"It's harder to laugh with a bloodied lip." Ron scowled down at his roast, stabbing it with his fork. "I'd like to see Cedric take on the first task with a concussion…"

"Oh, don't be stupid," Hermione said, pushing away her plate. "You'd be pummeled in less than a minute—they're seventh years. Besides, Cedric's not even with them."

Harry gave a brief sideways glance at that news. Hermione was right.

Ron sat up, clearly offended. "What do you think I've got Fred and George for?"

"Don't," Hermione warned. "They'll get you expelled—you can't afford any more trouble."

"Ooo," Ron hooted. "I'm trembling."

In spite of his somber mood, Harry found himself smiling a bit. It was nice to have Ron so flared up on his behalf, considering less than a week ago, Harry was almost certain Ron would never speak to him again. Harry also knew that Ron was as terrified of getting into serious trouble as he was of Mrs. Weasley's Howlers.

But the fact that he kept his apprehension well buried meant more to Harry than Hermione's good-natured sense at the moment.

Meant loads.

Hermione appeared less than amused, but Ron continued anyway. "Who's the one who smacked Malfoy's teeth sideways last term? Where was your worry then?" Ron smirked, rather pleased with his keen memory.

Hermione drew in a quick breath of air through her nose. "Yes, well…" She blinked. "The circumstances of that were extreme, and there's a clear difference between cruelty and stupidity, and—Oh, shut up, you two."

Ron nearly choked on a piece of potato.

"I'm going to class early," Hermione said crisply as she wrapped her thin arms around her mountain of textbooks, hoisting them with her as she stood. "Now that Professor Moody isn't teaching, I want to sit up front again."

"Shocking," Ron said with a sniff, shaking his head. "Very shocking."

Hermione's thick braids bounced against her shoulders as she hurried off.

"I'm starting to think she's really two people," Ron remarked, polishing off his apple cinnamon tart. "Rearranging Malfoy's face and then telling me to ignore the slimy wanker."

Harry shrugged. "That's Hermione for you."

"Yeah," Ron agreed through bulging cheeks full of apple filling. "Mental."

"Sirius told me the same thing."

Ron swallowed noisily as he glanced up from his empty plate. "Yeah, but that's Sirius," Ron explained. "He makes sense. And he doesn't nag. You know?"

_Not really_, Harry thought.

But he nodded absently. That was Ron for you. Harry wouldn't have his friends any other way.

* * *

The atmosphere in the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom reminded Harry of radio static. Whispered excitement. The fourth years (and for all Harry knew, the first through seventh years as well) had become accustomed to whispering in the Defense classroom before immediately falling into a silence full of anticipation once Professor Moody lumbered up to the front and scratched the chalk across the blackboard.

But this afternoon, the anticipation was cheerful. The nervous twist in Harry's stomach began to ease up once he understood that his classmates didn't appear as though they were ready to chase Remus out of the castle.

Everyone turned to stare as the door creaked open behind them. Remus was holding the door open with one of his scuffed shoes as he attempted to kick the doorstop underneath; he glanced up, smiled at them. "Hello, again."

Mumbled greetings. Three columns of eyes followed Professor Lupin's robes flapping at his feet as he made his way down the aisle. He caught Harry's eye and twitched his eyebrows.

"You won't need your quills today," Remus informed them as he placed his leather briefcase behind his desk. He smiled warmly, crossing his arms over his chest as he surveyed them. "Unless you'd rather stay in here?"

The classroom was suddenly filled with sounds of shuffling as the Gryffindors ducked below their desks to stuff their quills and books back into their bags.

Harry twisted his quill in his fingers and managed a half-smile in Remus' direction.

Remus raised his eyebrows again and nodded. The tired lines that usually stretched across his forehead had seemed to fade, even from this morning. He lounged against his desk as he waited for the students to put their things away. He seemed confident; comfortable. He seemed at home.

Harry leaned over to snatch his shoulder bag off of the floor, the other half of his smile finding its way to his face, even if he was only grinning to himself. For a moment, Harry's chest swelled with appreciation for what Remus was doing. And for Sirius, especially. He felt better.

"Right," Remus piped up, once the noise died down, "follow me, please."

In a few moments, they ended up at the top of the stairs in the Entrance Hall, standing in a semi-circle around Remus while he introduced their activity for today: spotting and revealing floating objects that had been disguised with a charm and hidden among the stone walls and portraits.

"An invisibility charm acts as a camouflage for whoever casts it, but it isn't quite the same as disappearing all together," Remus began; he stood with his hands clasped as he spoke, his wand holstered in his own armpit. "The movement of the charmed object or person can be seen with a careful eye, as it takes on the appearance of whatever it moves in front of…"

Harry had started out listening—he had—but the soft footsteps on the stairs had turned his head and kept it there. Now, Remus' voice drifted in and out of Harry's ears as his eyes flicked between Malfoy's smirking rat face and his professor's moving lips. This year, the Slytherins had a free period after lunch on Thursday, but it was rare that Harry ever ran into any of them during this hour; then again, it was rare for a teacher to take them out of the classroom. Moody never did.

Sensing a pair of eyes to his left, Harry turned to find Ron rigid and red in the face; he'd stopped listening as well.

Malfoy walked backwards a few steps away from the Gryffindors, sparing a quick glance toward Professor Lupin before feigning his best boo-hooing face, in honor of Harry, of course, and finishing up with a flash of his middle finger.

Harry had just spotted Ron's finger poking out of the sleeve of his robes when he felt a sharp jab in his ribs.

Hermione was staring at him.

So was the rest of the class.

Dean Thomas grinned slowly, showing all his teeth.

Harry's stomach swooped, but Remus only lifted his chin. "Have you an idea, Harry?"

Harry could feel his mouth hanging open. "Erm…what?" he managed.

Rolling her eyes, Hermione stuck her hand straight into the air.

"Give him a leg-up, Hermione," Remus suggested.

"About as long as Polyjuice potion," Hermione said clearly. "Except there isn't any warning of transformation."

"Would an enemy actually use that charm on themselves, then?" Seamus Finnegan asked, gazing up at Professor Lupin from where he stood—nearly under his nose.

Harry felt his face wash over with warmth. He had no idea what any of them were talking about.

Ron had gone back to listening, his eyes forward again, but Harry could tell by the way Ron's freckles had smudged together as he chewed on the corner of his lip that his best mate was silently fuming. His face was still pink.

"They would," Remus affirmed, resting a hand briefly on Seamus' shoulder, "which brings us to today's practical lesson. Move yourselves apart, facing the walls, please; wands out."

Ron swore under his breath as he plodded over to wall next to the banister, followed by Hermione and Harry, which left an arm's length between the three of them.

"Ron!" Hermione whispered in admonishment, gesturing toward Professor Lupin with a tilt of her head, but when Harry turned around, all he could see of Remus was the back of his head.

"What?" Ron grumbled, pushing up his sleeves. "Bet he smells like one too."

Harry grinned, shaking his own sleeves away from his wrists; he cracked both sets of knuckles before getting a good grip on his wand. "I think I see one," Harry muttered to himself, keeping a close eye on the barely-raised, stone-colored lump floating toward the ceiling.

Ron craned his neck and squinted. "Where?"

"There." Harry nodded toward the fuzzy mass-in-question.

"That's a cobweb."

"Isn't either," Harry disagreed. "It's… it looks like…" Dust? Ron was right; it did. Harry didn't even mind telling him so, seeing as Ron had risked a foul word _and_ a gesture in front of a teacher—even if that teacher was Remus. And he'd done it for Harry.

"Remember," Remus called out among the soft rumble of voices, which faded once he began speaking again, "just a simple _Finite Incantatum_ should do it. Speak as clearly as you can. Eyes open. Ready…"

Silence fell over the Entrance Hall as the class held its breath in concentration.

"Go."

The Hall was filled to the ceiling with a single shout of the incantation.

But Harry only caught a tiny glimpse of his floating object before he felt a sudden burning pain grip the side of his abdomen, as though he had just leaned into boiling water. Sparks of color exploded in his vision; he heard the clatter of his wand hitting the floor. Harry's tongue seemed to scratch his throat like sand paper.

"Good one, Harry!" Ron exclaimed over the gleeful chatter of the rest of the class. "It's an armored head…I wonder if—" A pause. "What's wrong, mate?"

Harry blinked, trying to clear the sparkling brown spots from his vision; he could barely make out Ron's frown.

"You're all white," Ron noted. He stood with his arms hovering in the air, as if he weren't sure what to do with them.

Professor Lupin's voice rang out among the voices of Gryffindors, but his words were muffled in Harry's ears. He pressed his hand to his side and saw stars again. He could feel blisters underneath his robes and shirt; his stomach turned.

"Must have backfired," Harry mumbled. His voice had risen way above his head. He lifted his arm to wipe the sweat that had beaded on his upper lip, but even that slight movement stung everything from his armpit to his hip.

"How could it have?" Ron sounded worried now. "I wasn't turned toward you—I don't think I was, anyway…" He tried to get Harry to lift his shirt, but Harry shook his head weakly.

"Not your spell." A strong, sour taste was beginning to climb up Harry's throat.

"Don't you two ever listen?" Hermione's voice cut into the peculiar haze of bright pain that Harry was experiencing. "We're going again—Harry, what's the matter?" She stopped brushing the hair back from her face to stare at Harry with that same grimace. "You're sweating."

"He got hit," Ron said seriously. "Look." He pointed toward Harry's stomach. "Show her."

"It's all right—"

"Professor!" Hermione called. A half-circle of heads snapped in their direction.

Harry saw more stars, but these burst into his eyes for a very different reason. "It's fine, Hermione; don't…"

But Remus' forehead had already taken on that wrinkled look once he caught sight of Harry.

"At ease, everyone," Remus said calmly, already walking toward the three of them, but his eyes were for Harry only.

The rest of the class had taken Remus' mildly joking command to heart; some were leaning their elbows against the banister as they waited. Nearly everyone, expect Dean and Seamus (who were busy identifying the second round of floating objects), had trained his eyes on Remus, talking softly as they waited to see what Hermione needed this time.

"Harry's hurt," Hermione muttered, lowering her voice so only Remus could hear. "Show him, Harry."

"Someone's spell backfired," Ron added. "Probably Neville's…"

Remus ignored this; he touched Harry's shoulder, squinting down his nose at him. "Where are you injured, Harry?"

"His side," Ron piped up, ducking around Hermione's bushy braids that she kept trying to toss over her shoulders. "He was holding it."

Harry tried to roll his eyes but even that took effort; if Ron weren't his best friend, Harry would have been tempted to knee him in the bollocks.

"I'm all right," Harry mumbled. "Just startled me is all." He looked straight into Remus' eyes, which were obscured by a few strands of sandy hair he hadn't bothered to brush away, and silently pleaded with him to leave it.

It was all Harry needed: to be checked over like a baby all because of a rash that happened to burn a bit.

Up until now, his friends in Gryffindor had refrained from taking the mickey out of him over getting pulled out of the Tournament. But if Remus insisted on undressing him right here in the Entrance Hall… All right, so it would only be his shirt, and just a corner of it—

"Let's head back to the classroom," Remus called out to the rest of the students; he was still frowning at Harry in contemplation. "A good job for today."

A quiet, unenthusiastic groan wafted through the Entrance Hall.

"Hermione," Remus said, reaching into his pocket, "here's the key; would you mind letting everyone inside? We'll be close behind."

Dragging a reluctant Ron by the elbow, Hermione hurried to the front of the group, holding up the key in her hand. Their scowls followed her first, then their feet, dragged along like stubborn dogs on leashes.

"Here," Remus began, hunching over awkwardly, the crisscrosses in his forehead and his eyebrows all tangling together.

But Harry held onto his shirt. "Why did he have to go and say that?" He glared at Remus as if he were Ron. "He always—"

"Who?"

Harry swallowed, unsure of where he was going with this argument. "Never mind."

"A quick glance is all I need," Remus said gently. "There's no one about."

The burning had lessened, but Harry's middle was beginning to ache now, deep down. He shrugged off one side of his robes, letting the sleeve dangle near the floor, and then peeled up a corner of his shirt.

Harry felt Remus' reaction rather than witness it, considering he found himself gawking down at the orange-red patch of skin on his side that was so blistered it looked like sauce bubbling on the stove. Harry was too surprised to be revolted.

Remus crouched down, fumbling for his wand. He urged Harry's shirt up a bit more, his lips tight with concentration.

He mumbled a long string of Latin words that Harry didn't recognize while waving the tip of his wand over Harry's skin.

Harry sucked in his stomach at the peculiar tingling sensation, watching as the angry blisters faded away.

"I'm not very good at this," Remus mumbled, eyeing the large splotch of pink irritation warily.

"Yeah, you are," Harry countered. He tried to let his shirt down, but Remus held onto Harry's fist. "You got rid of the blisters, didn't you?"

"This could be a recurring hex—you need to visit the hospital wing to make certain that—"

"No, it's fine," Harry argued, using little effort to pull away from Remus' hold. "It doesn't even hurt anymore. I think you fixed it."

Remus stared up at Harry from where he remained squatting on the floor. "This is a dark spell, Harry, a skin-boiling hex—a mild one—but you've no idea what those are like."

"My spell backfired…or Ron's did, not on purpose, but—"

"Spells don't backfire," Remus told him calmly, easing up into a standing position. "This hex was cast by someone."

Harry felt his scalp crinkle. He tried to shake his head but couldn't find his tongue.

"Did you see someone in the corridor?"

"I…I dunno."

"Anyone at all?"

"Only Malfoy, but…" Harry trailed off; his face began to feel hot. "He's not that stupid. You were right there."

"My back was turned." Remus' eyes were still and serious.

Harry wet his lips, scratched the back of his neck. Anything to keep from looking Remus in the eye.

Remus sighed. "Let's get you to Madame Pomfrey."

"I'm _fine_," Harry pleaded, putting his arm back into his robes. "I told you it doesn't hurt."

"I'd like you to see her, Harry." Remus' voice remained as kind as it always did, but Harry knew that in five minutes, he would be shirtless behind the curtain of Madame Pomfrey's examining room anyway.

"I'll go," Harry mumbled, and then seeing Remus' skeptical expression, he said more clearly, "I will, Remus. We still have an hour in your class; you don't have to go with me…"

Remus glanced over his shoulder, as if searching for a clock. And then he brushed his hair from his eyes, looking at Harry for a long time. "You really need to get that checked."

"I said I would."

More staring.

"Straight there," Remus finally decided, "as you promised." His face remained stony; almost confused.

Harry nodded, his eyes on the floor now. The sole of one of Remus' school shoes had detached itself from the toe.

TBC…


	10. Chapter Nine

**Chapter Nine**

Even from fifty yards away, the double doors of the hospital wing glared at him. Harry could see a blur of white robes bustling to and fro behind the clouded plates of glass, but it was difficult to tell if any of the beds were occupied.

All Harry knew was that he didn't want to be in one of them; not on his second day back. Not with Malfoy creeping about, throwing hexes at Harry when he wasn't looking.

Harry wasn't sure what was worse: the fact that his skin had just been bubbling or that that Malfoy had caught him unaware.

Harry could just picture that wanker in Herbology tomorrow morning with the rest of the Slytherins, laughing at his expense. Malfoy would mimic the droopy, shocked expression on Harry's face; he'd probably tell everyone how Harry had cried, like the baby he is. Or fainted. Malfoy had had a ball with that one last year, after all…

The hospital doors banged open.

Harry turned, ducking his chin, leaning his hip against a stone drinking fountain as he listened to footsteps thudding toward him. The sudden movement had his recently healed skin tingling again.

Harry peeked up to identify whoever was passing: Durmstrang's champion, Viktor Krum, was easing the collar of his tunic over his freshly bandaged shoulder as he lumbered away from the hospital wing, followed by Igor Karkaroff, headmaster of Durmstrang; Karkaroff's glassy eyes darted toward Harry, and then he muttering in low tones, in a language Harry didn't understand.

Viktor nodded at Harry as he rounded the corner.

Harry tried to nod back, but his neck felt too stiff; his face grew warm as he listened to their heavy-booted footsteps fade down the corridor.

Most likely, Viktor Krum had been injured during his training for the first task of the Triwizard Tournament, unlike Harry, who wasn't completely positive of how he had got _his_ injury.

Trying to explain that to Madame Pomfrey wasn't Harry's idea of a jolly-good afternoon.

The more Harry thought about sitting through a half-hour's worth of the woman's poking and prodding, the faster his spirits plummeted.

_Cheers, Sirius_, Harry thought glumly. He was obviously better at keeping his chin up than Harry was.

Pressing his lips together, Harry watched the Madame-Pomfrey-shaped blob whisk by the window again.

If Krum had just been treated, anyone could be in the hospital. Anyone could hear Harry fumbling for an excuse behind the curtain.

Seconds later, Harry felt his feet move, carrying him, the strings of his trainers flicking against the stone floor, and before he knew it, he was climbing the staircase that led to the seventh floor and the only place he felt like being at the moment.

When he reached the base of Gryffindor Tower, the voices at the end of the corridor sparked Harry's brain in to action; his feet lost the battle.

Quieting his breathing as best as he could, Harry listened.

It wasn't that the voices were unfamiliar; it was just that they fit together about as well as woolen socks with sandals; or pumpkin juice poured over cereal; or oil floating on top of dish water.

There were a thousand ways to describe the strangeness of hearing Snape's and Sirius' voices mixing together in conversation. None of them were agreeable in the least.

Out of sheer curiosity, Harry kept walking and was surprised to see a bald Black man in shimmering robes standing in a tight circle with Sirius and Professor Snape, none of whom were smiling. None of whom noticed Harry standing at the end of the corridor gaping at them, either.

Snape was gripping his lapels in white fists, pursing his lips in Sirius' direction; he somehow looked bored and disgusted at the same time.

Sirius had his arms half folded, knuckles against his lips: his thinking stance.

The other man stood calmly, his hands clasped behind his back.

Meanwhile, Barnabas the Barmy was shoving his own sword down his throat, his dusty tapestry waving serenely in the everyday corridor draft; he ignored the lot of them.

It was Snape who noticed Harry first; his eyes crawled over Harry's face, like black beetles.

Sirius stopped talking, his mouth hanging open mid-sentence. He turned his head, the frown that had pinched his face immediately loosened when he saw Harry. Stepping around the man with the shiny head, Sirius broke away from the circle, the corner of his mouth making a diligent effort to smile; he beckoned Harry forward with a tilt of his head.

Dragging his feet, his hands buried in the pockets of his robes, Harry obeyed.

"Hey," Sirius said slowly as Harry came into earshot. The frown returned to Sirius' face, but it was a different one than before. "I think I missed the bell—is it your dinner time?"

A disdainful sniff filled the air.

All eyes fell on Snape, whose lip had curled upward. "The dinner bell," the Potions master mocked. "On the contrary, Potter answers to the bell in his own head."

Sirius stared at him.

"You were unaware?" Snape sneered, his voice slimy with feigned innocence. "How unfortunate. Unsurprising, but a pity, nonetheless."

Copying Sirius' glare, the next thing Harry knew, he was brushing past the three of them, even Sirius, and knocking aside the tapestry; he let the heavy fabric flop down over his shoulders as he pushed his way into Sirius' quarters.

Yanking off his school robes, Harry wadded them up into a ball and chucked them, along with his satchel, into an empty armchair near the bookshelf in the corner and bounced, stomach-down, across the foot of Sirius' bed, his arm hanging over the edge of the mattress, the toes of his trainers still anchored to the floor.

Harry kept his face pressed into the clean quilt for a bit, hoping that any minute now, he would sit up and blink, find himself in his own room, and realize that today was nothing more than a dream-gone-wrong.

Harry rolled over onto his back and blinked, instead, at the vaulted stone ceiling overhead.

It was worth a try, at least.

The click of a door snapped Harry out of his brief reverie, as did the heavy sigh, like snow sliding from a roof.

As did the rumpled black robes that landed on Harry's face a second later…

"Early dismissal, then?" Sirius' voice seeped through the fabric muffling Harry's ears.

"Something like that…" Harry's voice was equally muffled, but not for long.

A cool breeze brushed Harry's cheeks as Sirius lifted the robes off of his face and squinted down at him, holding the bundle of cloth shoulder-level as though it were the lid of a pot.

Harry _had_ been sort of boiling underneath: his temper, his own bloody skin…

He supposed it fit.

Sirius studied him. "You look as though I've just chopped your broom up for firewood. What gives?"

Draping his forearms over his glasses, like way he'd seen Sirius do a couple of times when he didn't think anyone was watching, Harry spoke into the folds of his elbows.

"Do what, now?"

"Sodding…MALFOY." If it weren't for the muzzle of his own arms, Harry would have blown Sirius' hair back with that shout.

Surely.

"Malfoy again?" Sirius piped up. "What is it with that runty…" he trailed off.

Harry felt the mattress dip, felt his shirt creep halfway up his torso; Harry pulled his arms away from his face, lifting his head off of the mattress.

"What," Sirius began slowly, clinically, "could this possibly be?"

Gentle fingertips prodded the skin on one side of Harry's belly button.

Harry jolted up onto the points of his elbows. "It's nothing…it's—oh…" Gazing down in horror at the rosy patch of skin that was beginning to blister again, Harry felt his throat grow thick. The blisters were weeping this time. "Er…I didn't think…" Harry mumbled stupidly.

"What did you _do_?" The only part of Sirius that was visible to Harry was his godfather's scalp, as his face hovered mere centimeters from Harry's stomach.

"It's just a skin-boiling spell," Harry heard himself say as he sat up, with Sirius' help. _Hex_, his brain corrected for him. "It backfired on me." _Was hurled at me_.

Stickler for details, his conscience.

Sirius was gripping Harry's torso now, his thumbs framing either side of the burn.

"A skin-boiling hex?" Sirius repeated. "Who would agree to have his skin boiled off for practice? Here, stand up—"

"We thought it was healed…it only itches."

Sirius was bending at the waist, still gawking at the monstrosity under Harry's shirt. Harry stood awkwardly, frowning downwards.

"_We_?" Sirius said incredulously. "You and who else?"

"Who was that bald bloke you were talking to outside?"

Sirius peeked up, his face contorted. "I'm about to be holding half of your skin in my hands, by the look of things, and you're wondering about the 'bald bloke'?"

Harry craned his neck down further to see if Sirius was speaking the truth.

"Hold this away from your stomach," Sirius said, bunching up the hem of Harry's shirt as he stood. "You need the hospital wing."

"Aw, Sirius—"

"Spare me that, eh?" Sirius said. "One of us has to be worried…you can't even feel that?"

Actually, the more Harry observed the shiny blisters, the more he realized the itching was slowly giving way to an odd sort of smarting.

"Dunno."

"It's _your_ skin, you nutter…"

They stared at each other for a moment. As usual, Sirius cracked first.

"Well, come on, then."

Making a face, Harry opened his mouth to argue, but it only took one quick snap and a beckoning wiggle of Sirius' fingers to get Harry moving.

Once they were out in the empty corridor, they walked next to each other in silence for a moment, matching each other's brisk footsteps.

The air that swept over Harry's exposed skin felt cool and, oddly enough, moist. Like morning fog.

"I look like a dolt…"

Sirius gave Harry a passing glance. "Your hair does need trimming."

"I'm talking about my shirt: holding it like this," Harry clarified, as he retraced his steps to the hospital wing. "I look like—" He caught Sirius' eye. "Wait, what's wrong with my hair?"

A wink; a trace of a smile. Sirius kept moving.

_Fair try_, Harry thought. Sirius' worry radiated on a deeper level, though, and Harry knew it.

Even beneath all that tingling and itching, Harry's stomach managed to clench in dread once they reached the familiar double-doors. Sirius held open one of them with an outstretched arm and ushered Harry through with a gentle press of his fingertips.

Like the corridor, the hospital wing was blissfully empty, save for a young-looking ghost in Hogwarts robes drifting about the row of windows.

Madame Pomfrey bustled into sight round the curtain that concealed one of the examining tables. She was holding a jar of cotton balls in one arm and a stack of fresh linens in the other. Her eyes narrowed once she spotted Harry.

"You again, is it?" she chirped, sending the sheets flying in ten different directions with a quick wave of the wand she'd somehow managed to retrieve from her pocket. She gave Sirius a pointed nod. "And you."

Harry looked over at Sirius, surprised that, unlike most everyone, Madame Pomfrey seemed to bypass the gawking part when it came to his godfather. Didn't seem nervous, either.

Sirius gave Harry a meager shrug.

"Up onto this table," the healer ordered, patting the one behind the curtain. "I daresay you know the drill, Mr. Potter."

It was Sirius' turn to look at Harry, but Harry could only manage a half-smile that ended up as more of a crooked squint.

"As would you, Mr. Black." Madame Pomfrey's back was turned, but Harry could still hear her muttering about "those four" giving her nightly migraines.

Harry glanced over at Sirius again, but this time, his godfather was squinting at a small portrait on the wall of a young wizard getting his arm bandaged. "He looks terrified."

"Give him a minute," Harry commented, recognizing the portrait all-too well. "He's a right git."

On cue, the boy in the painting squirmed off of the examining table and went skipping around the room, leaving the healer to chase after him.

"Ah." Sirius nodded. "I remember him now; shifty little bugger."

Harry tried a smile, but his face felt droopy; a melted wax face.

Meanwhile, Madame Pomfrey stalked down the aisle, her heels clicking against the floor as she flicked her wand against the air; a dozen hospital beds were instantly stripped and redressed with clean linens.

Harry lifted himself onto the table, but he allowed Sirius to help him pull his shirt the rest of the way over his head and off, since his arms were suddenly feeling stiffer than normal.

"You're sweating." Sirius' voice sounded funny. Muzzy and strained.

"Huh?" Harry blinked at the spots that had begun to reappear in his peripheral vision. "Oh, yeah," he mumbled. " I know. It's warm in here."

Sirius frowned, touching the backs of his fingers to Harry's cheek. "No, it isn't."

"Well…" Madame Pomfrey came into view, sliding the curtain back a bit. "What is it this—" She absolutely stared at Harry, her eyes sliding down to the circus freak show attached to his body; the metal container full of thermometers nearly slipped from her grasp. Her lips became thin, as though they were sewn together; she swept the curtain closed and then advanced on Harry. "Lie back, please—no, head right here."

Sirius lurched away from the spin of her robes and moved to stand by Harry's head as Pomfrey puttered around the area; she remained silent while she gathered up a heavy glass bottle full of purple liquid, a small corked vial, and a pile of cloths.

"Drink this," she ordered, uncorking the vial and pressing it to Harry's bottom lip. Sirius cupped his hand around Harry's neck and helped him to lift his head. "You'll thank the stars for it."

It tasted potent and familiar; Harry wrinkled his nose as it went down.

"What is that?" Sirius' voice drifted high above.

"Pain-relieving potion."

She took hold of Harry's shoulder and hip and turned him on his side, much too easily for Harry's liking. "Hold him still, if you would," Pomfrey muttered to Sirius, who immediately took hold of Harry's shoulder, leaving Pomfrey hoisting up his other end to keep him balanced.

Harry nearly died of embarrassment, even in the midst of the tingly, warm haze that seemed to be smothering him. But soon, even Pomfrey's hand on his bum became a distant memory as something cool and wet trickled all over the burn on his stomach.

Harry felt the stinging first, saw the smoke rising from his abrasion, and then he knew: he'd had enough Quidditch injuries cleaned out with that same purple liquid to know what it was. He also knew that with the size of his injury, the pain reliever had kept the cleansing potion from burning like fire.

Didn't stop him from tensing up, though.

Sirius tightened his grip on Harry's shoulder.

An instant later, the stinging stopped and Madame Pomfrey was patting Harry's stomach dry with one of the cloths. "Good lad."

Harry realized he'd been holding his breath and let it out in a great _whoosh_ through his nostrils. Sirius let out his breath as well. He squeezed Harry's shoulder again before letting him down gently, and Harry suddenly felt hot all over with embarrassment.

"I have seen some dueling injuries in my time, Mr. Potter," Madame Pomfrey muttered, clucking her tongue every few words. "But I can easily say I've never…" She trailed off as she concentrated on healing Harry's burn—for the second time—though her wand movements looked far more complex than Remus'. She cast a sharp eye in Harry's direction once she had made his skin pale again. "You children ought to be more sensible…"

"With what?" Harry couldn't help but ask.

"Hm." She narrowed her eyes in thought as she continued to stare at Harry.

In the midst of all the stinging and humiliation, Harry found it wasn't difficult to scowl at her either. "I wasn't dueling."

"Spilled a potion in Professor Snape's class, then?"

"No," Harry insisted. "I don't have Potions until tomorrow; I was in Defense Against the Dark Arts—"

"Practicing hexes?" The woman's questions were relentless, like an index finger poking Harry in the chest.

If only he could bat her away.

"His spell backfired," Sirius spoke softly, though he wasn't smiling. "It was only an accident."

"You were practicing in pairs, I see."

Harry shook his head; the spots in his vision seemed to have grown larger. "It was just _Finite Incantatum_." He tried to push himself into a sitting position, but the pressure on his shoulders had him lying right back down.

"Rest a moment," Sirius said. "You're looking a bit white."

As Madame Pomfrey took Harry's pulse with two fingers at his wrist, a thermometer floated across the bed and hovered over Harry's nose.

"Lift your tongue," Madame Pomfrey commanded.

"I don't need my temperature taken," Harry told her.

"You might," Sirius commented.

The healer muttered some numbers in the direction of a floating quill and pad of paper; obediently, the quill began scribbling.

"Pulse at a gallop," Pomfrey said to herself. "Come, now, open up." She gestured toward Harry with impatience.

"Really, I think I'm all right—Oy—" The thermometer moved in blinking speed and slid itself into Harry's armpit. "Okay…okay, fine," Harry muttered, reaching for the glass stick. "It can go under my tongue." But Sirius pulled his hand away.

Madame Pomfrey ignored him as she bustled around.

"Just relax, Harry," Sirius said gently; the amusement in his voice was evident. "It's charmed—it barely takes a second."

Harry knew that, but still.

His armpit.

Madame Pomfrey had some nerve.

Harry lay stiffly for a few more seconds until Pomfrey swept over and rescued the thermometer from under Harry's arm.

"Just as I thought," Pomfrey said. She glanced down her nose at Harry, who was glaring up at her sourly.

"What is it?" Sirius asked, twisting around to catch a glimpse of the red stripe.

"One-hundred point three."

Harry pushed himself up by his elbows. "That's not so high."

"Just wait, you," Madame Pomfrey said, the vague threat in her voice a nagging fly round Harry's face—another thing he wouldn't mind batting away.

"A skin-boiling hex is meant to affect your temperature?"

Harry looked over at Sirius; his godfather had a grim look about his face, but it didn't quite mirror Harry's frustration.

Near Harry's feet, Madame Pomfrey was bent in half, rummaging through the same drawer in which she'd taken the stack of bed linens. "It's a dark curse," Madame Pomfrey replied after a moment; her voice echoed hollowly in the drawer, and Harry longed to nudge it closed, trapping the voice inside. "One that takes intention," she continued, straightening up, now quite red in the face. She held a pair of green and white striped pajamas, which Harry zeroed in on immediately. Her next words were a blur. "I've yet to see someone suffer the effects of a curse like this one from a backfired incantation, I might add." Eyeing Harry skeptically, she placed the pajamas in his lap. "Might as well settle in for the night, Mr. Potter; I shall be keeping a close eye on that fever. You may change behind this curtain."

Madame Pomfrey swept the curtain closed without another word; the scrape of the metal rings assaulted Harry's ears like the falling blade of a guillotine; he was suddenly smothered by the whiteness of the enclosed space: white cotton, white curtain, white sheets, white noise…

But when Harry looked down at those green-striped pajamas, he felt more clear-headed than he had all day. He shook his head at Sirius. "I'm not staying here; she can forget it."

"It's only for the night," Sirius said; the words came out cool and soothing, but there was something about the way Sirius' eyes were scanning Harry's hospital pajamas, something about the way Sirius leaned with his hip against the examining table: bracing himself. "She used to threaten to harness your dad in his bed." A remembering smile. "Don't give him a run for his money…"

_Ha ha, _Harry thought dully. He pushed the pajamas off of his lap and reached for his shirt, avoiding Sirius' eyes as he tried to put his arms through.

"Now just hang on a moment." The soothing voice returned but the laughter had drained right out of it.

Weakly, Harry shrugged away from Sirius' hold on his shoulders; one arm of his shirt still dangled.

"Hang on, I said."

Harry didn't struggle this time; his muscles sagged like dough in Mrs. Weasley's kitchen. He blinked hard at the metal tray across from him; the thermometer lay where Pomfrey had set it, straight and obedient, like everything else in this wing, leaving Harry feeling as out of place as the squirming boy in the portrait.

Enough time passed with Sirius standing there, squeezing Harry's shoulders but not saying anything, that eventually, Harry's eyes grew tired of staring at medical supplies.

Sirius was searching Harry's face; his own eyes looked tired as well, shadowed. "Tell me what's wrong."

Harry's swallow seemed to stick in his throat. "I can't stay here."

"Here at Hogwarts, or _here_, here?"

Harry flapped a hand toward the examining table beneath him.

"Why not?"

"I just can't."

"Hm," Sirius murmured, drawing in great breath through his nose, "that tells me loads." His eyes were soft. He threaded his fingers in Harry's fringe and pushed the hair away from his specs. "C'mon, Bub," his godfather continued. "You're a bit listless these days, and that's enough to worry anybody. I'm listening."

Harry twisted the button on the cuff of his school shirt. "It's just—"

"Are you decent, dear?" Madame Pomfrey's bellowing had Harry's heart skipping a beat; he'd nearly forgot she was here. The curtain twitched.

"Half a moment," Sirius called back, hurtling forward as though preparing to become a human partition.

But the clicking of Madame Pomfrey's heels on the floor had already resumed in steady staccato. "No hurry," she chirped from the middle of the room.

_Very likely_, Harry scoffed. Hurrying was Pomfrey's whole life.

As her bustling noises grew more distant, Sirius reached into his outer robes, which hung loosely about his shoulders, and drew his wand from the holster hooked onto his trousers. Casting a quick Silencing charm—Harry recognized the wand movement—Sirius slipped the stick back into its holster and used his hands to lift and settle himself onto the examining table, right next to Harry, his toes skimming the floor.

Harry glanced down at his own leather lace-ups dangling in mid-air.

"All right," Sirius said with resolution. "I'm still listening—and she can't—go on."

Even with the Silencing charm, Harry barely spoke above a whisper. But once Harry mentioned Cedric and the Hufflepuffs the laughing and Malfoy being a git, he found his voice again; the words seeped out like sand through a sieve, leaving only the bit about the skin-boiling hex.

"Once the First Task is over, I doubt anyone will remember your name came out of the Goblet with the others in the first place," Sirius consoled. "I know it doesn't seem like that now…"

Harry gave him a look.

"It's only been two days."

"It barely took Ron two minutes to start hating me when he thought I was showing off," Harry mumbled toward his trousers, warming unpleasantly at that memory, which stung more than any other he could remember. "Two days is bloody long, Sirius." His godfather didn't say anything to that, so Harry took that as leave to continue. "You don't know what it's like."

"Hm," Sirius murmured, nodding slowly. "Try twelve years."

Harry's head snapped up. His stomach clenched as he scanned Sirius' face for signs of anger. "I'm sorry…"

Sirius lifted his eyes, frowning.

Swallowing hard, Harry picked at the only part of his shirt he was still wearing: the right cuff.

"That brow," Sirius said, reaching over, pressing the pads of his fingers against Harry's forehead. "Entirely too much worry. You'll have wrinkles by the time you're out of Hogwarts, old man." He let his arm fall to his side again.

"Maybe not," Harry croaked, his chest fluttering in relief: massive, flapping wings. He relaxed his forehead.

Sirius' eyes shone. "You're putting up a tough fight against those people," he continued, "and you're very brave for that. But it's hardly easy, is it?"

Focusing on his trousers again, Harry shook his head.

"Not at all," Sirius agreed. "I know."

They sat quietly for a moment, and then Harry pulled his sleeve the rest of the way off. "Everything feels like it did two years ago," Harry said in frustration, "when everyone thought I'd petrified Filch's stupid cat…" And Harry hadn't anyone but Ron and Hermione to tell about that then, so he'd had to let the hurt simmer inside of him. He could recall the awful, stuffy feeling in his chest every time someone had glared his way, and Harry didn't want to go through another several months like that. "It's embarrassing," Harry finally admitted.

"It probably doesn't help that I'm trailing after you like your shadow," Sirius sympathized. "Add Remus to the mix, and you've got your very own bodyguards." He poked Harry's knee.

"You don't trail me," Harry said with a small smile. "It's been all right, actually."

Sirius' face lit up with a slow grin and then he leaned forward, his wrists against his own knees. Even though his godfather didn't say anything, Harry could feel Sirius beaming beside him.

"I should've known it would be like this," Harry said, "with Malfoy, I mean. Maybe I did."

Sirius looked over his shoulder. "What did he do, exactly? I was a bit preoccupied with keeping you from melting on the quilt—we never quite got to that."

Harry scratched at his stomach, where the skin was still tender from healing. "Dunno, really." It was the truth.

"Did he do that?"

Pausing mid-scratch, Harry flicked his eyes toward Sirius'. "Might have."

"Might…" Sirius trailed off. "Why didn't you say something?"

"I said he _might_ have, Sirius." Harry shifted on the table.

"'Might' as in 'a very good chance', yes?"

"Mm," Harry disagreed, shaking his head. "'Might' as in 'might'."

Sirius' eyes traveled from Harry's stomach to his face. "I see no difference…"

Gripping the table beneath him, Harry considered this. "Look, it's not—"

"Is that why Pomfrey asked if you'd been dueling," Sirius cut in. "You hadn't, had you?"

Harry gaped, owl-eyed at his godfather. "You're joking, right?" Harry asked, disbelieving. "Why would I do that? McGonagall would put me on dorm restriction, if she didn't kill me first—and then you'd kill me…"

"I'd never kill you," Sirius countered with a twitch of a smile on behalf of Harry's effrontery. "I'd have no one to talk to."

"And besides," Harry continued, hardly finished, "why would I duel in the middle of Remus' class? I'm not that stupid."

"Rather bright, actually."

"She's stupid if she thinks I did," Harry said sourly.

"Then what's this rubbish about Lucius' kid, and boiling skin, and you ending up here in these smashing pajamas?" Sirius tossed his hair away from his eyes and frowned, appearing more confused than before. "You've lost me."

Harry shrugged his response; the words stuck stubbornly in his throat.

"I need more than that, Bub, if I'm going to be of any help…"

"Yeah…" Harry could feel Sirius' eyes on him. "I know."

"Can't be that awful, can it?"

Harry shrugged again, shook his head. "It's just…I dunno…it's embarrassing."

"What is?"

"This." Harry gestured toward the pile of pajamas to his right. "Being stuck in here when everyone already thinks I'm a nancy for dropping out of the Tournament." There. He'd said it. And once he did, the rest tumbled out quite easily. "Getting hexes thrown at me when I can't see, just to make me look like a prat—trying to make me pass out again, like last year…"

"Pass out?"

"And Snape stares at me all through meals," Harry grumbled, bypassing the fainting issue altogether. The anger he had felt several days ago was rising to the surface, even though he wasn't sure where he was directing it. "It's bad enough he was tracking me all summer; why can't you tell him to leave me alone?"

Sirius blinked at him.

"I hate being the one everyone stares at." Harry jammed his bare shoulders against the cold wall. "And I hate that someone put my name in the Goblet." He swallowed hard against the tingle of fear that had crawled up his spine and settled in his throat. "And I hate these sodding pajamas."

Slowly, his godfather relaxed his back against the wall, so that he and Harry sported matching slumps.

"I'm sorry," Harry mumbled, still feeling rather miserable but less like a flaming boil about to pop.

His glasses were slipping down his nose. He left them alone.

"I hate that your first Quidditch World Cup was cut short," Sirius began.

Harry looked over at Sirius, but it was his godfather's turn to study the metal tray. It was the first time since the end of August that Sirius had mentioned the attack at the World Cup.

"And," Sirius continued, twisting the button on his own shirt cuff, "I hate that you can't even enjoy the first Triwizard Tournament they've had here at Hogwarts for who knows how long..."

Harry shrugged. "It's not so bad."

The corner of Sirius' mouth curled, but he kept staring. "I'm not sorry to say that I hate those pajamas as well. She's offered those since I was eleven…probably when your granddad was eleven."

"Or _his_ granddad," Harry added. "They're awful."

"Color's not too horrible…"

"That's the worst part."

"Hm." Sirius leaned over, away from the wall; he tilted his head, sizing up the green stripes. "You may be right."

They shared a brief smile.

Sirius reached over and nudged up Harry's nosepiece with a fingertip before resting his palm on the top of Harry's head.

They sat that way for a moment.

Madame Pomfrey's shoes click-clacked in the distance.

"We'll send for your pajamas and slippers…your toothbrush and everything. How's that?"

The words hung over both of their heads. And then Harry understood. "Sirius," he groaned. "Do I have to?"

"Oy, give us a listen…"

"I feel better," Harry pleaded. "Really."

Sirius pressed his hands against his knees. "Did you hear what Madame Pomfrey said? About monitoring your temperature?"

Harry nodded glumly.

"She knows a curse when she sees one," Sirius said. "Believe me."

"I know, but—"

"But…" Sirius echoed. "But what? You said you believed me."

"I do, but—"

"You're at it again."

Harry twisted his lips together, his shoulders sagging.

"Go ahead and put your shirt back on," Sirius urged, nodding toward the rumpled heap. "I'll explain about the pajamas."

Harry obeyed in slow, rusty movements, his neck receiving a warm squeeze of approval as he did up the buttons.

"How much of your class do you have left?" Sirius asked. "Twenty minutes?"

"I think so."

Sirius glanced around for a clock before suddenly remembering the watch he kept in his robes pocket. "Just about twenty-five," Sirius confirmed, squinting at the small, pearl clock-face. "I need to go on a quick hunt for Dumbledore. Will you be all right, getting settled in here until I come back?"

"How come you have to find Dumbledore?" Harry asked. And then he added, "Yeah, I'll be fine."

"Just a few questions for him," Sirius supplied. He eased off of the examining table.

Harry sat as tall as he could, trying to tuck in the tails of his shirt. "Does it have to do with whatever you were talking to Snape about? And that man with no hair?"

"Ah," Sirius said as he lifted his chin to clip the neck of his robes together, "you remembered."

"It's a bit hard not to," Harry admitted. "You standing there with Snape. . . "

"Unforgettable, that one."

"Sirius?"

"Hm?" Extending a hand, he helped Harry slide down from the table.

"Will you tell me what you three were talking about?" Harry asked. "I mean, you can tell me later if you'd like."

"I'll give you the gist," Sirius said warmly; he kept his hand on Harry's shoulder as they escaped to the other side of the curtain. "Let's worry about this first—Oh—"

Madame Pomfrey's shoes squeaked against the floor as she halted just before colliding into them.

"Heavens," the woman exclaimed, wide-eyed, pushing back the white cap that had fallen over her eyebrows. "Thought the two of you had managed to sneak away—where on earth are your pajamas, Mr. Potter?"

"Er…"

"I'm going right now to collect them," Sirius said smoothly.

Pomfrey gave Harry her best cat-eyed expression.

Hand still resting on Harry's shoulder, Sirius guided him toward the bed that had its sheets and blankets turned back at the corner, leaving the woman staring after them.

TBC…

* * *

**Author's Note**: Thanks so much for the reviews, everyone :-) If you're following my other story, Mindful Eyes, it'll be updated next!


	11. Chapter Ten

**Chapter Ten**

"Password?"

"Acid Pops."

A thoughtful pause, followed by a slow, sly grin. "Incorrect."

"That's impossible," Sirius muttered, frowning down at the stocky gargoyle that guarded Dumbledore's office. "I was just in here today."

"The password to the headmaster's office was changed precisely half an hour ago," the gargoyle nearly growled.

With one hand on his hip and the other threading through his hair, Sirius took a deep breath. "Is Dumbledore in, then?"

"That all depends." Another unctuous smile spread across the stone face.

"On what?"

"Have you the password?"

"You know I haven't—"

A low chuckle echoed through the corridor.

"But I have my wand, haven't I?" Sirius threatened; his temple was beginning to pulse with a headache—should have snagged some of that pain relieving potion his kid had had the displeasure of choking down.

The gargoyle ceased its sinister sniggering. Puffing out its chest, the statue straightened its spear and became petrified, its slanted eyes cold and hard as pebbles.

"Shit." Dropping his hand to his side, Sirius sidestepped the hideous statue and pressed his palm against the cool surface of the concrete entrance to Albus' office, feeling around as though he could somehow push his way through.

The sound of footsteps and wind-swept robes had Sirius turning around.

"I'm afraid no one has left a list of passwords lying around this time, Black."

Snape.

"Although, if I were Albus Dumbledore, and the likes of you were under my roof, I might be obliged to change them just as frequently." Snape's black eyes resembled the gargoyle's—only muddier. "Step aside, if you can be troubled to…"

Without waiting for a clear path, Snape lunged into Sirius' personal space and wrapped his fingers around the point of the gargoyle's spear.

Sirius backed away from the entrance at the same time the door disappeared into the wall, scraping itself open, revealing the first of several steps that spiraled up to Dumbledore's office. But before Sirius could fall in step behind Snape, a black-sleeved arm shot out, poking two long fingers into Sirius' chest.

Grimacing with disdain, Sirius moved away from Snape's obstructing arm. His whole face was pulsing with heat that had nothing to do with embarrassment. He could feel his jaw twitching, but Sirius remained silent, meeting Snape's smirking gaze head-on.

It only took a minute of this for Snape to realize that Sirius wasn't planning on speaking—or moving. And when he did, the small bit of mirth drained from Snape's face, pulled his brows downward, leaving his face ugly and gray.

Bitter.

"The headmaster isn't here." The words slid around in Snape's mouth in that hateful way he reserved for Sirius' ears alone. "He accompanied Kingsley Shacklebolt back to the Ministry of Magic, to sit in on a meeting with the other Aurors. He will return by nightfall." He turned.

"And he's left you here to play Headmaster, has he?" Sirius kept his voice steady. "That's big of him."

"More than I can say for you," Snape sneered over his shoulder, "playing House with Potter and the Werewolf, neither of which have managed to get through an entire lesson since their return. Dumbledore should be commended for his decision-making."

The heat rose along Sirius' neck again, this time at a dangerous temperature. "You're damn right, he should."

"Shacklebolt hasn't a clue for whom he is searching," Snape ground out between thin lips, "nor does anyone else. The Polyjuice could have been consumed by the Minister of Magic himself, for all we know. So I suggest, Black, that you do your duty as godfather—" The moniker curled Snape's lip as though it were a swearword. "—and see to it that your ward keeps his place for once. Do us all a favor."

The grinding of the door seemed to spark Sirius' consciousness, but it slammed closed in front of his nose before he could say anything.

The _smack_ of flesh against stone sliced through the silence of the corridor as swiftly as the pain sliced through Sirius' palm. He smacked the wall again.

He stepped back, his heart pounding in his throat. He ran his stinging fingers through his hair as he stared at the gargoyle.

Reaching forward, obeying a rather childish notion, Sirius touched his fingertips to the point of the spear. He clutched it.

The door remained sealed.

The gargoyle's eyes remained dead.

Sirius turned and tucked his shirt in as best as he could. He shoved his hands into his pockets as he glanced down the corridor, looking at nothing in particular.

He walked on.

At some point, the bell rang hollowly through the corridors. Footsteps pattered, voices droned. Doors knocked into stone walls. It took Sirius a short while to realize he was standing in the rush-to-dinner crossfire. The suits of armor on either side of the Entrance Hall staircase seemed poised, girded for the stampede of black-robed adolescents that would come swirling by.

Sirius turned toward the laughter behind him; two young Hufflepuffs—probably first years—jostled each other. They bit their lips when they caught Sirius' eye; the laughter slinked down their throats. They hurried past him.

Sirius rubbed the back of his neck before stuffing his hands back into his pockets; he leaned against a corner and waited out the stream of whispers and whites of eyes that trickled by him. Aside from the occasional squeak of a trainer, the corridor remained quiet.

Sirius studied his fingernails. Harry would claim that he needed an afternoon coffee, with the way Sirius' fingers were pulling at his neck.

A few stragglers jogged by. The walls let out their breath.

Sirius continued on his way toward Gryffindor tower, letting out a deep breath of his own. A short flight of stairs and two corridors later, Sirius nearly collided with a tangle of limbs, textbooks, and faded robes—a walking cloak rack; gold-colored eyes peeked out from under a shock of fringe, hooking Sirius and dragging him back a few steps.

"Have you—"

"Did you—"

The questions collided, the way they had since the two of them were twelve and inclined to finish each other's sentences—something even he and James hadn't mastered.

The pale eyes smiled; the fringe sat upon an even paler forehead like the brim of a hat. "Did I what?" Remus shifted his books to his other arm. "You look out of breath."

Sirius thought about that; he squinted. "Do I?"

Remus nodded. "Have you seen Harry yet?" He frowned as he attached the latter half to his earlier question. "He left about a half hour ago—"

"Longer than that…more like forty-five minutes ago," Sirius corrected. He breathed carefully through his nose; he _was_ a bit winded. "I don't think it's been an hour since he came to me—or you sent him to me, I mean."

"I didn't send him to you."

"After he was injured, I mean—"

"I sent him to the hospital wing."

The walls seemed to crowd Sirius' shoulders again, huffing down his neck. "No, you didn't…"

"I did, Sirius." The books sagged in Remus' arms now, pulling the robes from his branch of a shoulder. "Is he not there?"

"He is now." Sirius felt his whole face wrinkling in confusion. "Of course he is. Do you know what happened—"

"A skin-boiling hex," Remus supplied with a brief nod. "Why didn't he go to the hospital wing himself?"

"He…" Sirius trailed off, tilting his head in disbelief. "You didn't follow him there?"

"Well…it appears that way."

A befuddled pause shivered in the air, like the echo of the end-of-class bell. "This is Harry we're talking about…"

"You're right." Remus wore an amused frown. "_Your_ Harry James, the boy who's been to the hospital wing a dozen times last year alone. Why on earth would I trail him?"

"Because he—"

"He knows exactly where I sent him," Remus said evenly. "He promised me he'd end up there."

"Just like he promised me that cloak of his would stay where we'd placed it…"

Sirius could see the wheels turning behind Remus' face, but he kept the words trapped by tightly pressed lips. Just long enough to cause Sirius to want to yank them out. Even over twelve years later, Remus still knew how Sirius worked. And Sirius knew Remus knew.

Neither of them had to say it. But Sirius didn't always have to appreciate it. This was one of those special circumstances.

"Harry had no intention of getting treated," Sirius explained, trying not to seem as frustrated as he felt. "He was so riled up by Lucius Malfoy's kid that he almost forgot he was even injured."

"Oh, he would have brought it up—"

"Like shite he would have." The curtness of the statement poked a hole in Remus' optimism, deflating the atmosphere of the small corridor.

Resting his stack of books on the window sill, Remus tucked his hands into his armpits. "You don't think so?"

Sirius leaned the small of his back against the wall. He didn't know what to say. Or maybe he did. Maybe he couldn't. That was it.

"Look, mate," Remus sighed in his smooth-it-over voice, "I trusted Harry to keep his word, like he usually does, especially since he looked to be in quite a bit of pain; I didn't see it as an issue. And if I had, you know I would have been the first to…" Remus trailed off; his eyes tightened at the corners when he realized that Sirius was only half-listening. "What is it?"

Slicked blond hair had reached Sirius' vision before the sound of even, shuffled footsteps and murmurs reached his ears. Sirius recognized Lucius' son right away, as he only had one of his mates with him, and dark hair spoke nothing of the Malfoy line.

Remus had craned his neck in the direction of Sirius' eyes.

Shock splashed over Draco's face when he recognized Sirius and Remus standing at the far end of the corridor, leaving the smug, fashionably-late smirk to drip right off of his pointy chin and onto his smart school shoes. He grabbed a handful of the tall boy's sleeve and urged him round the corner with a twitch of white eyebrows and an offhanded tug at his own lapels.

Gesturing vaguely to Remus, Sirius was already moving forward. "Have you had it out with him yet?"

"Sirius—"

Trailing behind, Remus' soles flapped against the stone floor.

"Did you even—" Sirius quelled his attempt at directing his questions backwards while walking forwards and jogged a few steps to reach the corner. "Oy!"

The echo of Sirius' shout bounced off the ceiling and down a narrow staircase, where both boys snapped their heads around.

"Sirius, wait a moment." Remus was at his heel now, but Sirius didn't turn around. He watched the lanky, dark-haired Slytherin soak up some of the unease that had stiffened the shoulders of his friend, whose gray eyes were wide and still, easily ignoring the nervous, flickered glances from the other one.

Sirius hadn't much interest in his given name during his adolescence, when he would have rather been named after a famous Quidditch player rather than a constellation, but the power of hearing his own name in public—and witnessing _those_ reactions—still startled him. The single word cracked like a whip in the air, turned heads, had teeth biting down on lips.

Frightened Malfoys, apparently.

Sirius swallowed away the peculiar feeling in his chest and drew a wayward strand of hair from his face. This wasn't about him, after all.

"Where were you practicing this afternoon?" The question was for Remus, but Sirius kept his eyes squinted in Draco's direction. The boy still hadn't blinked.

"The Entrance Hall, the landing at the top of the stairs—"

"Did you pass through that area?"

Realizing after a moment that this question was for him, Draco took a deep breath and lifted his chin, a gesture that made the boy appear years older; a mirror-image of his father.

"No, sir, I was in the common room," the tall one mumbled, still passing quick glances at Draco.

"We haven't a class then." Draco's chin stuck out defiantly.

Sirius stared at him.

"Theodore," Remus spoke gently, "would you give us a moment?"

With a final glance toward his friend, Theodore chewed on the corner of his lip and nodded; he seemed to curl into himself as he clambered down the stairs and sank into the shadows.

Draco didn't even watch his mate go; he lifted his chin a bit higher, but the attempt at looking superior failed him; his nose had twitched several times, and Draco looked much younger when he scratched at it.

Sirius caught Remus' eye. Remus shook his head, the movement tiny but clear. Clutching at his neck again, Sirius took a small step back and waited.

"Someone was injured today in my class, Draco," Remus said calmly, clasping his hands behind his back. "We're not quite certain what caused it, but the incident occurred at about the same time several students saw you passing by."

"Sir?"

The polite inquiry was automatic, innocent enough. But Sirius sensed the haughtiness behind it, accompanied by the snap of an eyebrow down to a moth-eaten hem, scanning the deep wrinkles in the mud puddle leather of his professor's shoes. A smirk curled the boy's mouth in the same direction as his eyebrow. Draco Malfoy's defense was a steel wall, held up by his father. But Sirius could also tell that Remus was used to this, for he, too, had raised his own silent defense. Remus hardly cared what people thought of him. In fact, he had a pair of shoes that were even tattier than the ones he was wearing. And he loved them.

Remus continued the investigation. "Did you see anyone in the corridor when you passed through the Entrance Hall?"

Sirius sighed, deep in his throat. Remus had given the little wanker an out. Crossing his arms tightly over his chest, Sirius squeezed his hands in his armpits to keep them patient.

"No, Professor."

"Consider the scene carefully," Remus suggested. "There were quite a few of us there; another body wouldn't have seemed to stand out.

Draco swallowed and wetted his lips, obviously surprised by the gentle prodding. He wasn't smirking anymore.

Remus was making the kid nervous.

_Good_, Sirius thought. _Great, even_.

"I just walked by," Draco muttered, his voice growing lumpy. His eyebrows squirmed on his forehead now. "I hardly saw a thing—didn't even know it was your class, really." He glanced down the staircase leading to the dungeon, silently dismissing himself.

Remus offered up a half smile. His teacher face. "Think on it a bit."

The boy blinked in flutters.

Sirius bit the insides of his lips to keep from smiling. _Ah_, he mused. _So this is how Moony does it_.

"One of Potter's friends could have misfired to injure him, you realize," Draco said in a bored tone. "With Longbottom in that class, it's no wonder—" The supposition shrank to the back of the boy's tongue.

Sirius's spine tingled as the frostiness in Draco's gray eyes thawed, leaving them foggy and lost; the boy had realized his mistake.

Sirius tried to catch Remus' eye, but his mate was still locked in to professor mode. Remus had caught the slip-up as well.

"Misfires, I can understand," Remus said coolly. "Hexes are another matter entirely, especially when an opponent's back is turned."

The boy's pale skin instantly pinked.

Sirius could feel his teeth gritting among the fresh tension.

"I'm afraid I don't know what you're implying, sir." Delivered by a cracking voice that betrayed the offended frown.

"I'm afraid I do." Sirius couldn't help himself. He'd sat on his voice box long enough, like a jittery primary school boy's hand that ached to poke and pull hair.

A glance and a mouth-twitch in Sirius' direction summed up Remus' lofty opinion of _that_ outburst.

Sirius shrugged with his eyes.

Remus proceeded with the business at hand. He lowered his chin, keeping his gaze on the boy. The confession had already tip-toed out of the lips that were currently tight with embarrassment; Remus needn't do much else. "Would you be willing to put your claim to the test?"

Understandable fidgeting as the cloudy eyes searched his professor's face. "How do you mean?"

Putting his hands on his knees, Remus drew his voice down to match. "I'll need your wand, please."

Draco blinked, coming back to himself. "What? Why?"

"Just get it from him," Sirius muttered to his own shoulder. "You're his teacher…"

Remus ignored him; he spoke even softer. "This isn't for keeps, Draco. Your wand, if you please."

"I—" The boy scanned the corridor for refuge. Finding none, his lips pinched with a mix of apprehension and disgust. "That couldn't be allowed."

Remus straightened, as though he'd expected the response. "If you were unaware of the situation like you've claimed—" Here, Remus paused, holding the boy's gaze. "—this shouldn't go any further than here in this corridor, should it? But we can certainly speak to Professor Dumbledore if you'd like."

Draco's mouth gaped like a fish and then closed again. Red splotches stained the pale cheeks. Had it not been for his godson's skin almost boiling off onto Sirius' quilt, he might have been able to dig deep and find a bit of sympathy for the painful humiliation that had gripped Malfoy's son like a fever.

Sirius could see the end of the boy's wand sticking out of a pocket inside of his robes; Sirius' fingers itched to snatch it.

"I—" The footsteps on the stairs had Draco's head swiveling, cutting off anything else he might have said.

"Two adults to one student." Black robes floated up the staircase like the threat of a rainstorm. "An interesting form of inquisition, though I must say I find myself terribly…unsurprised." The curl of Snape's lip reached the top of the stairs before his boots did. "Old habits refuse to perish." An even stiffer smirk. "As do those who possess them…"

A pair of downcast eyes peeked over Snape's shoulder.

"Dinner, Mr. Nott." Snape's gaze dragged over the three of them, ignoring the student trailing on the stairs behind him. He snapped his fingers behind his back and pointed in the direction of the scent of roasted meat. "Quickly. You're tardy."

"Aren't we all…" Sirius muttered. He crossed his arms across his chest and took another step back, transforming their small circle into a half one.

Theodore ducked around his Head of House, taking long, grasshopper-like strides until he disappeared round the corner.

"Invisibility Charms," Snape recited, sneering over the cover of the topmost book in Remus' stack on the windowsill as he strolled closer. His eyes, hooded and cold, found Remus. "For fourth years? How appropriate." He caught Draco by the arm and yanked the Slytherin out of the half-circle so abruptly that Sirius, on reflex, stuck out both arms to keep the whirlwind of blond hair and black robes from tumbling into him…or onto the floor.

"Dinner, Draco." Another snap. "Now."

The boy's head jerked up; several carefully oiled pieces of hair had fallen across his eye. Snape glowered down at the disorder.

"Actually, Severus," Remus said, readjusting his robes over his shoulders as he stepped in front of Sirius, "he and I were having a rather important discussion—I'm glad you stepped in."

"Glad..."

Moving into the new circle of grownups, Sirius pressed two fisted knuckles under his nose.

Draco continued backing up until his behind bumped the railing, and then, looking distinctly out of sorts, he used his fingers to comb his hair into immaculacy, watching Snape all the time.

"So important a discussion should require the presence of the student's head of house, should it not?" Snape said silkily. The question evaporated in his mouth. It had its own answer.

Sirius glared at the man—at the collar that choked him, the black hair that hung on him, the sleeve of his robes that shielded the boy behind him.

He thought of Harry, waiting with those rotten green-striped pajamas on his lap, probably tucking his fingers into his fists to keep from biting his nails, which had finally grown beyond the quick. He'd been practicing that lately; grinned, even, when Sirius mentioned it.

Sirius' hands became hot with sweat; his blood boiled. "A bit like the importance of a head of house knowing exactly what his student has been up to during his free period," Sirius declared, choking back the venom that longed to lurch from his throat. "Only took sixty minutes to get a hex from yours—" He indicated Draco with a nod. "—and a hospital trip for mine. Hardly compares to an entire summer of lurking after my kid with nothing to show for it, does it?"

"Sirius—" Remus.

"Should be proud of that, shouldn't you?"

"Pity only one of us knows the definition of such a word, Black."

"Let's move this to my office, shall we—" Remus again.

"A _skin-boiling_ hex." Sirius threw his words against Snape's forehead. "That's no classroom misfire."

"I didn't!" Draco blanched.

Snape's eyes darted over the blond hair that had curled around the boy's nose again.

"Check his wand, then," Sirius challenged, feeling belligerent—the kind of belligerency he forced Harry to take deep breaths through and then count to ten, frontwards and backwards. Good job his kid wasn't here. "Go on."

"Please," Remus spoke quietly, "let me handle this."

"Even Snape knows you have rights to—"

"Sirius." The whisper sneaked out from under Remus' fringe. "Take a walk."

Sirius' heartbeat was in his throat, his nose, his hair, even. He _was_ his heartbeat. If only Snape would glare at him instead of that boy. Coward.

Sirius felt a pressure on his elbow; he glanced down; Remus was attached to him. "Let me handle this," he said again.

The blood drained right down to Sirius' toes, leaving him cold all over. He stared at Snape, willing the man to stare back. He swallowed hard. "My kid needs his pajamas."

"Go get them," Remus muttered. "I'll be right there."

Sirius finally felt the stinging in the palm he'd scraped on the door to Dumbledore's office. He put it into his trousers pocket and left the circle; he didn't look back.

* * *

"It's completely sensible—I don't know why I didn't think of it before."

"I don't know why I didn't either. Well, actually, yeah, I do," Harry amended, drawing his knee closer to his chin as he perched on top of the hospital bedclothes. "It's stuffed up in Sirius' wardrobe in his bedroom at home."

Hermione nodded, seeming to accept this.

Ron shifted at the edge of the bed to keep from sitting on Harry's foot; he rubbed at his cheek. "Maybe Sirius brought the map with him."

Harry shook his head. "It's safer at home. Remember what Remus said last year? Sirius's locked it up."

"Warded it, you mean," Hermione corrected; she kept glancing over her shoulder to watch for Madame Pomfrey's return from Snape's storage room, knowing very well that the second Pomfrey bustled in through the double doors, their visit would be cut short.

Ron rolled his eyes. "Same difference, Hermione."

"Oh, for heaven's sake, it isn't either—"

"He might have warded it as well," Harry broke in. "But he locked it first; I saw him. We keep the key in one of his shoes."

The setting sun sparkled in Ron's ginger hair, causing him to look doubly excited. "Brilliant! It'll be easy."

"No," Hermione snapped, and then, taking a deep breath, "no, no, never again…I'm _through_—"

Ron gawked at her. "What are you on about?"

"If you go through the Floo again, I'm telling Sirius," Hermione threatened, tucking her hair behind her ears matter-of-factly. "And then I'll go to McGonagall. I don't care if you never speak to me again—"

"Hermione…" Harry squinted at her in confusion. "Stop. I'm going to ask Sirius about it when he gets back."

"Yeah," Ron added sourly, so sourly that Harry knew the thought hadn't even crossed Ron's mind. "Think we're bloody idiots, do you?"

The doors to the hospital wing flew open, but Harry was so busy giving Ron a _belt up_ look that he didn't pay much attention to whoever was moving in his peripheral vision.

Hermione, who was already sitting on the very edge of the bed next to Harry's, had pushed herself to her feet.

"What? What'd I say?" Ron piped up, his eyebrow twisting toward his hairline.

Ignoring this, Harry kicked his legs over the side of his bed to get his shoes off the sheets. But it wasn't Pomfrey. "Hey, Sirius."

His godfather gave him a close-lipped smile and lifted his eyebrows in greeting as he took a bundle of sleep things out from under his arm and held them up for Harry to see.

"I found clean pajamas." He tossed the cotton trousers and t-shirt onto the mattress. "Miraculous, really."

Harry smiled back. "Cheers."

"And this."

A toothbrush bounced off of Harry's thigh and onto his folded t-shirt.

"And this as well."

A wad of socks.

"Oh, and this…"

Close enough now, Sirius handed Harry the bookmarked novel that he, himself, had kept on his night table for the past week.

"You're finished with this?" Harry peeked up, skeptical. _Ghost Warriors_ was over five-hundred pages long.

"Mmhm." Another casual smile, this one for Harry's best mates. "All right, you two?"

"Hi, Sirius," Ron and Hermione said together.

Sirius squatted down and reached out toward Harry. "How's the stomach?"

Without meaning to, Harry scooted back a bit and pulled down the hem of his shirt; his face warmed. "It's fine," he said quickly. "Doesn't hurt, I mean."

Seeming to understand, Sirius nodded as he sat on the bed that Hermione had just vacated. "Dinner's been set for ten minutes," his godfather informed them; he winked. "Smells like it, anyway. I'll see to it he gets tucked in nice and tight."

"Aw, geez, Sirius—" A pillow tossed in the direction of Harry's face muffled the rest of his complaint.

"You're tortured, I know." And then, turning to Ron and Hermione, Sirius sobered a bit. "Go on, now, before it gets cold."

"Or disappears," Ron corrected this time, standing and moving next to Hermione. "That's even worse."

"Tragic," Hermione muttered. She cast a pointed eye in Harry's direction as she dragged Ron out by the wrist, mouthing, "Don't forget to ask him!"

"See you tomorrow, Harry," Ron called over his shoulder. "Bye, Sirius."

Sirius waved behind him.

Madame Pomfrey was holding the door open for them with one arm and clutching a cauldron-full of something powdery in the other. Sparing a nod for Sirius, Madame Pomfrey headed directly for her office. "Dinner in a quarter of an hour, Mr. Potter, unless you're feeling peaky. Then nutrient supplements, it is…"

"Which reminds me," Sirius declared, inching closer to the edge of the mattress, "lift that shirt."

Grateful for the empty room, Harry did as he was asked, allowing his godfather to inspect the damage.

"A bit better," Sirius decided. "Feeling _peaky_ at all?" The crooked smirk that drifted across Sirius' face told Harry that his godfather knew exactly how Madame Pomfrey made Harry feel: dangerously close to chewing his nails to the quick again.

Harry rolled his eyes. "I've felt fine ever since you left. You were gone forever—where'd you go?"

"Whom did I run into, you mean…"

Shrugging, Harry toed off his shoes and used his heels to nudge them underneath his bed. "Or that, yeah." When Sirius didn't go on, Harry glanced up. "What? It wasn't Fudge, was it?" He wrinkled his nose at the vision of those fluorescent, pin-striped trousers marching about the school corridors. In honor of the upcoming First Task of the Tri-Wizard Tournament, the bloke had been stalking Hogwarts off and on for the past month, always showing his teeth: a skin-crawling impression of Gilderoy Lockhart, if you asked Harry.

"No, not Fudge," Sirius replied as he leaned his elbow onto the stack of pillows near his hip. "Professor Dumbledore is in a dinner meeting with him at the Ministry."

Harry watched Sirius watching him. He recognized the look on Sirius' face right away. Whatever news his godfather had gleaned wasn't going to be pleasant.

"What?" Harry asked quietly.

"Did Remus ask you to come straight to the hospital wing after all this happened with the hex?"

Wearing the same vague grimace as his godfather, Harry pulled his feet back up on the bed and thought through the past hour. His brain had been a bit preoccupied, after all. "Well, class hadn't ended and he told me that…" The memory stung him, right in the half-skinned gut.

Sirius raised an eyebrow.

"Oh, yeah," Harry mumbled, feeling his gaze droop on its own. "He did."

A nod from the other bed. "He said he did."

"Yeah, he did," Harry repeated, wondering where the tennis match of shame-faced agreements would end. "Did he come find you, or did you just run into him?" The first option would be much worse.

"Well," Sirius began, his pillowed elbow moving to join its mate on Sirius' knees, "I think I caught him as he was coming to the hospital wing to see you."

"Oh." The whole ordeal hadn't seemed so important when Harry had decided to find Sirius instead of dashing into the hospital wing like Neville covered in an exploded potion, but with the way his whole skin was starting to burn, Harry was sensing his mistake quite quickly. "If Remus mentioned it, he's angry, isn't he?"

"No," Sirius said soothingly, "he's not angry. He was worried about you. He had to watch you limping away…"

"I didn't mean to worry him."

"I know, but that's not quite the issue…"

"I know," Harry muttered. And he definitely did know. They'd been over this particular _issue_ a hundred times. Sirius' eyes were kind under his dark brows, but they didn't help Harry feel any less guilty.

"Would you have gone on your own if I hadn't taken you to get patched up?"

Less guilty, no. More truthful, yes.

Harry shook his head. "No, sir." He bit his lips for a moment, feeling awfully rotten. "Sorry, Sirius."

Sirius laced his fingers together, as he considered Harry with those same kind eyes. "All right," he concluded gently. "We'll work on it."

"I'll tell him I'm sorry."

"I think that's a fantastic start; very fair of you." A sad smile creased Sirius' face. He reached over and pinched Harry's nose between his knuckles. "I'm no Sir."

Harry tried to smile as well, but as the realization of his blunder with Remus was still washing over him, he found it a bit difficult. He shrugged. "Habit—creeps up sometimes."

"Put your sleep kit on," Sirius instructed with an important nod toward Harry's pajamas. "I searched for hours."

Harry indulged his godfather with a half-hearted laugh through his nose as he moved off the bed and made a grab for his kit; he was still thinking about Remus.

"What are you supposed to remember to ask me?"

Dropping his t-shirt on the floor, Harry cast down a befuddled frown. "Ask you…"

Sirius leaned over to retrieve the shirt, but he kept his eyes on Harry. "Am I not supposed to know?"

"Know what, Sirius?" Taking the shirt from Sirius' grasp, Harry added it to the top of his pile as he tried to shake out the cobwebs of shame that were making his head feel fuzzy.

Straightening out of his slouch, his godfather tilted his head and peered at Harry through one eye. "Hermione—before she left, it looked like—"

"Oh!" Harry exclaimed, comprehension splashing him in the face. "Oh, yeah, she told me—" Flipping his head back to look for a clear area, Harry sat back down on his bed. "—she brought it up, I mean."

"Brought what up?"

"The Marauder's Map," Harry clarified, the sheepishness escaping him for the moment. "She said we should use it to see if Peter Pettigrew is on the castle grounds, like we did last year. He showed up as a rat, so he'd show up as Professor Moody, wouldn't he?"

"He'd show up even if McGonagall transfigured him into a carrot…"

Harry found it a bit easier to smile now. "I know. See? Anyone would."

"That was good thinking on Hermione's part," Sirius said. "I don't know why I didn't consider it."

"You hid it, that's why," Harry reminded him. "I didn't think of it either."

"I'll get it tonight—Dumbledore doesn't even know that map is in existence." It was Sirius' turn to look sheepish. But unlike Harry, Sirius could smile through it. "I make mistakes as well, you see…"

Lowering his gaze once more, Harry twisted his lips as the embarrassment crawled up his spine with its spider legs.

"We'll try to be sharper about our memories, eh?"

We.

Not I. Not you.

It was moments like these that made Harry's dull memory instantly sharpen. He loved Sirius an awful lot.

"Now," Sirius went on, clearing his throat as he stood, "hop into those sleep clothes before Madame Pomfrey comes after you with the green ones again—then you actually _will_ feel peaky—and one more thing…" Curling his fingers around the base of Harry's neck, Sirius pulled Harry close and ducked down a bit. "Apologize, and let it go," he whispered reassuringly. "Do you hear me?"

Harry shrugged.

Reaching around, Sirius popped Harry lightly on his seat.

"You'll apologize," his godfather muttered again, a bit louder this time, "and then—"

"—I'll let it go."

"You'll let it go," Sirius agreed with a nod.

After a long moment of staring at the buttons on Sirius' collar, Harry nodded as well, once again, thoroughly grateful for the empty hospital wing.

Sirius squeezed Harry's neck. "I'll be right here waiting, Bub."

Tucking his pajamas and clean socks underneath his arm, Harry shuffled over to the nearest curtained area. But before he could draw back the drape, he caught sight of Remus standing in the threshold of the infirmary entrance.

Harry's stomach curled with guilt. He watched for a moment as Remus greeted Madame Pomfrey, who had just closed the door to her office. The pleasant politeness on Remus' face dropped as soon as the woman turned her back. Sticking his tongue in his cheek as though he were thinking about something, Remus looked straight ahead, searching. Then his eyes fell on Sirius.

Remus nodded at him.

"You should have been into those pajamas an hour ago," Madame Pomfrey's voice crept up behind Harry, causing his shoulders to jerk in surprise. She swept open the curtain. "In you go. And I'll hear no more fuss about it, Mr. Potter."

If he would have been truly listening, Harry might have pulled a face at her, but seeing as Remus hadn't seen him yet…or moved.

Setting his pajamas on the table, Harry grabbed a fistful of curtain but watched for a few seconds longer. Remus had eased the door closed behind him and was walking toward where Sirius was standing.

Harry jerked on the curtain before he could decide if Remus' nod had anything to do with him; its white hem dangled over his feet, tut-tutting and shaking its head.

Two pairs of men's shoes faced each other in the middle of the floor.

"I knew it…" His godfather's voice.

_Knew what_? Harry thought. Socks, underpants, and a wrinkled school shirt flew in all directions; he had never pulled on his pajamas so fast. The two of them barely seemed to notice that a pair of smaller feet in socks had joined the meeting, a less tidy bundle of soiled, wadded clothing under his arm.

"Dragged him straight down to the Dungeons," Remus reported, speaking under his breath. Glancing sideways at Harry, Remus laid a warm hand on Harry's head, just for a second. "You've got some color back in your face."

Harry felt himself flush, adding to that color. "Erm…"

"Then he's protecting him from the consequences," Sirius decided. "Could've guessed that much." Sirius glanced Harry's way as well. "That was quick, mate."

"You didn't see the look on his face, Sirius." Remus almost snorted. "There is no protecting taking place in Severus' office right now. Believe me."

Sirius stood there, pinching his lips between his knuckles.

All of a sudden, Harry knew.

TBC…

* * *

**Author's Note: 'Twas a long chapter, sooo does that make up for my posting lackage in the SFS department? ;-) Thank you for the reviews and for continuing to read after over a year of my being a slug. **

**On a sidenote, did anyone find him/herself squealing when Sirius popped up on the latest HP: DH2 trailer? Guilty. Oh, the Gary O. love.**


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